Apple is preparing to raise the price of its products to absorb the soaring cost of memory and storage chips, chief executive Tim Cook has confirmed in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, in the clearest signal yet that the artificial-intelligence boom is now landing squarely in the consumer’s pocket.

“Unfortunately, price increases are unavoidable,” Cook told the newspaper. “We’re doing our best to mitigate the huge increases that are being passed to us, and we’ve been trying to shield our customers from the increases, but the situation has become unsustainable.”

Cook declined to specify when the rises would take effect, how large they might be, or which products would carry them. Apple’s next significant launch is expected in September, when the iPhone 18 range, tipped to include the company’s first foldable handset, is due to arrive. Price changes on Macs and iPads could come sooner. The group quietly lifted the starting price of the Mac Mini last month, between launch events.

The trigger is an extraordinary surge in demand for memory and storage chips from AI companies, which has pushed component costs up so sharply that Apple would have to raise device prices substantially simply to hold its margins steady. The research firm TechInsights estimates that passing the higher costs straight through to buyers, while protecting profitability, would add roughly $270 to the price of the next iPhone Pro.

Memory and storage chips sit inside almost every computing device, from smartphones and laptops to games consoles, medical equipment and cars. The problem is that AI servers are now consuming these chips in rapidly rising volumes, leaving even a company as cash-rich as Apple struggling to secure supply. As the company found with Trump-era tariffs that threatened to push iPhone prices sharply higher, external cost shocks have a habit of finding their way onto the shelf price.

Since last year, when Google, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon began announcing big increases in their capital-spending budgets, the prices of memory and storage chips have both quadrupled. TechInsights expects both to keep climbing into 2027.

The two components do different jobs. Memory, known as DRAM, behaves like the desk in a mid-20th-century office, holding the papers a worker needs for the task in hand. Storage, known as NAND, is the filing cabinet that holds everything else. A smartphone uses DRAM to run the apps currently open, and NAND to file away photos and videos.

Cook said both markets were a concern, but singled out DRAM, pointing to the growing share being diverted to so-called high-bandwidth memory used in AI servers. “There’s less supply at a time when consumers want devices and the memory guys are passing along huge price increases,” he said. “We definitely need memory pricing and supply to return to reasonable levels for consumer products. That’s the bottom line.”

Three companies dominate DRAM: Samsung and SK Hynix in South Korea, and Micron in the United States. NAND is made by those three plus Kioxia and Sandisk. Their share prices and profits have exploded over the past twelve months, with Micron and SK Hynix up more than 800 per cent, and Kioxia and Sandisk up some 4,600 per cent.

Capacity is being added, but not fast enough for consumer buyers. Morgan Stanley forecasts that production capacity for DRAM wafers, the silicon discs on which chips are patterned, will grow 30 per cent by 2027. Yet as suppliers prioritise specialised AI memory, wafers for consumer technology are expected to fall up to 15 per cent short of demand. The squeeze is not Apple’s alone: industry analysts at IEEE Spectrum have charted how the AI build-out is draining DRAM supply away from the mainstream electronics that households actually buy.

China has national champions in memory and storage, but under national-security rules American companies would probably need licences to work with them. Asked whether those restrictions should be eased, Cook said: “I think everything needs to be on the table,” adding, “I think we should look at all supply.”

Apple is far from alone. Hewlett-Packard, Dell and Nintendo have all raised prices, and a consortium of industry associations recently wrote to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick complaining about the over-allocation of memory to AI buyers and asking for help to lift supply. The pressure on consumer pricing has been building for months, as Business Matters reported when memory costs threatened to add hundreds of pounds to the price of an ordinary laptop.

Morgan Stanley estimates a 15 per cent rise in smartphone and PC prices in the United States this year. The effect on the consumer price index should be modest, given the small weighting such devices carry, but any rise on the popular iPhone is likely to attract attention in Washington. Bloomberg has described the resulting crunch as a fully fledged chip crisis, with prices climbing across the board.

Compounding matters, Apple needs additional DRAM to power more AI features, including the rebooted Siri unveiled last week. The company has also long relied on NAND storage upgrades to lift profits, charging $100 to $200 for extra increments that cost it a fraction of that, the very products now caught in the price spiral.

In the interview, Cook said Apple was ready to deploy its cash reserves to help boost memory supply. “We’re willing to use our balance sheet to help be a part of the solution,” he said. “Obviously, more capacity is needed.”

He offered no specifics, and the practical difficulty is plain. It is unclear how Apple could match, let alone beat, the terms AI hyperscalers are offering to lock up supply: three-to-five-year agreements with large cash prepayments that run against Apple’s long tradition of disciplined spending. Nor will the company build its own factories. “We can’t do everything,” Cook said. “We know what we’re good at.”

Apple spends in the low tens of billions of dollars a year on memory and storage, according to people familiar with its costs, making it one of the largest buyers in the world. Historically it has used that heft to wring the keenest prices from suppliers, playing them off against one another. Now, with AI companies storming the market, even Apple has to queue.

For Cook, who has spent more than four decades in the electronics supply chain at IBM, Compaq and Apple, the swing is without precedent. “This is a hundred-year flood,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything like it in any area in over 40 years.”

For consumers and the small businesses that kit out their teams with iPhones, iPads and Macs, the message is blunt: the AI gold rush now has a price tag, and it is about to appear on the till receipt.

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Tim Cook says Apple price rises are ‘unavoidable’ as memory chip crunch bites

The pain for backers of a green energy investment trust has deepened after the one-time stock market favourite axed its dividend and pressed ahead with plans to wind itself down.

Shares in SDCL Efficiency Income Trust fell by 11½p, or 25 per cent, to a record low of 34½p on Tuesday after the trust said it would not pay a fourth interim dividend for the last financial year and would suspend future cash distributions.

The move was disclosed alongside the trust’s blueprint for liquidating itself. It warned that it would concentrate on cutting debt and “preserving value” before returning any further cash to investors, in a wind-down that could run for years.

It is a further blow to the green vehicle’s beleaguered backers, who are already sitting on heavy losses and now face wiping out as much as half their money. It also comes after the trust fell into the sights of Saba Capital, the American hedge fund that has been shaking up the usually sleepy world of investment trusts. For readers weighing up the sector, our explainer on how investment trusts have changed the face of UK finance sets out how these vehicles are meant to work, and where the risks lie.

Saba has campaigned aggressively at a string of underperforming trusts for strategy changes and board overhauls since late 2024. With SDCL Efficiency Income Trust, known as Seit, the New York-based fund is understood to have been among the shareholders that opposed an alternative proposal under which the company would have carried on in a different guise. According to the Association of Investment Companies, the industry body, Saba has built positions across dozens of London-listed trusts, pressing boards to hand cash back to shareholders.

The decision to shut up shop is a spectacular reversal of fortune. Seit was once popular with institutional and private investors alike, tapping them for almost £1.2 billion across ten fundraising rounds between 2018 and 2022, including its original listing on the London Stock Exchange eight years ago.

It used the proceeds to assemble a portfolio of environmentally friendly investments, spanning industrial rooftop solar panel systems, LED lighting used in poultry farms and electric vehicle charging stations.

Its share sales were sometimes oversubscribed. Its final placing in September 2022, which raised a bigger than expected £135 million, was priced at 114p a share, more than three times Tuesday’s closing level.

Since then, Seit’s stock has slumped under the weight of higher interest rates and falling valuations for its assets, leaving the shares trading at a yawning discount to net asset value. The trust was valued at less than £400 million by the stock market on Tuesday night. The episode is a reminder of how quickly sentiment can turn, even after a spell when interest rate cuts looked set to revive appetite for green energy investment trusts.

The independent board, chaired by Tony Roper, and the manager, Sustainable Development Capital, had floated the idea of reviving the trust’s fortunes by converting it from a trust into a conventional operating company.

After weighing up feedback, however, the board concluded the plan lacked sufficient support. Saba, which is run by Boaz Weinstein and now holds a 20 per cent stake in Seit, is understood to have been among several investors against it.

The trust said in April that “a significant number of shareholders expressed a clear preference for liquidity” and that it would instead draw up wind-down proposals. It said on Tuesday that the plan, if approved by shareholders at a meeting on 10 July, would see Seit stop making new investments beyond follow-on capital for assets it already owns.

“The board believes that a sale of the entire portfolio, whether to a single purchaser or a small number of purchasers, would likely be the most efficient means of realising value for shareholders,” the trust said. “If a portfolio sale cannot be achieved on acceptable terms, the company will pursue asset-by-asset or grouped disposals.”

Seit warned that the whole process “could take a number of years to complete” and that cutting its borrowings would take priority. Its gearing stood at 71.9 per cent of net asset value at the end of September, above the 65 per cent limit set in its investment policy.

The trust has borrowed about £190 million under a revolving credit facility, and said that only once this had been “significantly reduced” would the board “reconsider its position on paying interim dividends if circumstances allow”.

The retreat caps a torrid 18 months for the closed-ended sector, much of it driven by Saba. The fund recently agreed a three-year truce covering several London-listed funds after a deal over the Herald Investment Trust, as reported by CNBC, though Seit’s collapse shows the pressure on weaker trusts has not let up.

Investors tempted by bargain-basement discounts elsewhere would do well to revisit the basics of how to choose an investment trust company before catching a falling knife.

Saba did not comment.

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Green energy trust scraps dividend and heads for wind-down, leaving investors nursing heavy losses

John Roberts does not do diplomatic. The founder and chief executive of AO World has rounded on the government after the online appliances retailer confirmed it is shifting the bulk of its customer contact operation to South Africa, a move he laid squarely at the door of higher employment taxes and a rising minimum wage.

The company, best known for selling everything from laptops to fridges and washing machines, has already offshored around 150 sales roles, banking savings of roughly £2 million so far and pointing to annualised cost reductions of about £4 million. A further 50 jobs are due to be created in South Africa, with most of AO World’s customer contact work expected to be based overseas by next March.

Roberts, who built the business from a £1 pub bet in 2000, said the retailer was carrying an extra £8.5 million in annual costs after the government’s decision last April to lift employer national insurance contributions and push through an above-inflation increase to the minimum wage.

“The brutal truth is that, of course, these roles could have been in the UK,” he said. “When you make these staff ever more expensive and ever more inflexible, that’s what businesses are going to do. We’ve got a political class that doesn’t understand business. They live in an economic fantasy land.”

It is a complaint that will resonate well beyond Bolton. The combined weight of a 15 per cent employer national insurance rate and a sharply lower secondary threshold, introduced in April 2025 alongside a 6.7 per cent rise in the National Living Wage to £12.21 an hour, has reshaped the maths for any firm with a large, lower-paid workforce. AO World is simply one of the larger names to act on it, joining the likes of Morrisons, which has blamed Labour’s “policy choices” for a wave of store closures, and JCB, which paused a 500-job hiring drive as the tax changes bit.

For smaller employers the squeeze is arguably sharper still, with the lower threshold dragging part-time and entry-level roles into charge for the first time. Guidance from the government-owned British Business Bank underlines how tightly wage floors and payroll taxes now interact, a dynamic Business Matters has tracked as employers absorb a national insurance bill running billions of pounds above Treasury forecasts.

Yet the political broadside lands on a set of results most chief executives would happily own. On an adjusted basis, pre-tax profit rose a better-than-expected 16.1 per cent to a record £50.5 million in the year to 31 March, helped by a turnaround at the contract mobile phone arm and at MusicMagpie, the used-electronics specialist acquired in 2024. Revenue climbed 11.4 per cent to £1.3 billion, also ahead of expectations, with a 17 per cent jump in television sales in May as shoppers geared up for the football World Cup.

The board rewarded investors accordingly, unveiling a £10 million special dividend and confirming plans to return a further £20 million this year, split evenly between another special dividend and a fresh share buyback. The numbers vindicate the “pivot to profitability” Roberts has pursued since the pandemic-era online boom faded, a period in which AO’s shares were battered by wobbling consumer confidence, rising labour costs and fierce competition.

That reset has been deliberate. Roberts has spent recent years taking what he calls “the grit out of the machine”, stripping out costs and simplifying the group after it considered shutting its loss-making mobile division and, in 2022, closed its German operation following a strategic review. The post-pay mobile business is now profitable after improved commercial terms with network partners and expanded tie-ups with Samsung and Lebara, while analysts at Peel Hunt flagged a return to profit at MusicMagpie.

The wider picture is one of a business in rude health. AO World, a constituent of the FTSE 250, added 720,000 new customers over the year to take its base to 13.3 million, and has wiped out its debt, swinging to £16.4 million in net funds from liabilities of around £35.9 million a year earlier.

Investors, though, were unmoved on the day. Shares gave up an early gain of 2.6 per cent to close down 4.69 per cent, or 4½p, at 91½p, with the stock off roughly 3 per cent amid heightened geopolitical tensions since February.

Management, too, struck a note of caution, warning that the external environment remained “uncertain, with ongoing geopolitical pressures impacting both consumers and input costs across the economy”. Profit for the 2027 financial year is expected to come in around £54.6 million, broadly flat on the year.

For now, the headline AO World would rather you remembered is the record profit. The one its founder wants ringing in ministers’ ears is the 200 jobs that, on his telling, did not have to leave Britain at all.

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AO World chief blames Labour as record profits mask shift of 200 jobs to South Africa

Ministers are weighing up whether parts of a clampdown on the low-value imports that power Shein and Temu could arrive sooner than planned, after sustained lobbying from British retailers who say the current timetable leaves the high street exposed.

The government confirmed last year that reform of the so-called de minimis regime, which lets goods worth less than £135 enter the UK without customs duties, would not be fully in place until 2029 because of the complexity of building a new customs system from scratch. Now, officials are understood to be examining whether elements of that reform can be brought forward while still keeping goods flowing freely at the border.

The consultation on the design of a replacement system closed in early March, and ministers are still working through the responses. For retailers who have spent the better part of two years arguing that the relief tilts the pitch against them, even that assessment period feels too slow.

The de minimis exemption has become one of the defining battlegrounds in the contest between established British retailers and the fast-growing overseas platforms snapping at their heels. Shein and Temu, both founded in China, have expanded rapidly in Britain by shipping low-cost goods directly from manufacturers to shoppers, sidestepping the duties and overheads that domestic firms shoulder when they import through conventional supply chains.

Names including Sainsbury’s, Currys and AO World have argued that the carve-out hands overseas rivals a structural advantage. It is an argument that has steadily gained volume, with UK retailers calling on the government to end China’s tax-free advantage and warning that the playing field has been tilted for too long.

The government has already said it intends to abolish the exemption, a position set out when Rachel Reeves moved to review the import tax loophole in its crackdown on cheap overseas goods. But it has insisted that a phased transition is needed to avoid disruption at ports and customs checkpoints. Officials say a new system for collecting duties on low-value parcels has to be built, in their words, “from the ground up” to cope with the sheer volume of packages arriving in the country, and that businesses moving and selling food will also need time to prepare. The full design is set out in the Treasury’s consultation on reforming the customs treatment of low-value imports.

The timetable has frustrated retailers, who have stepped up their lobbying in recent months. Last week Andrew Murphy, chief executive of toy seller The Entertainer, wrote to the government urging ministers to accelerate the reforms, describing the current schedule as “unacceptable”.

Industry groups have also warned that Britain risks becoming an outlier as other major economies move faster. The United States scrapped its own low-value import exemption last year, while the European Union is preparing to introduce a temporary customs duty on low-value parcels from next month before bringing in wider reforms, a shift confirmed by the European Commission’s taxation and customs directorate. The fear among executives is that, as doors close elsewhere, more low-cost and potentially unsafe goods will simply be redirected towards the UK, a concern that has already prompted warnings that delay risks turning Britain into a ‘dumping ground’.

The Treasury, for its part, is holding the line on both the destination and the pace. “The rapid growth in low-value imports is hurting our high streets and retailers,” it said. “We are removing the customs duty relief for low-value imports and reforming the way these goods are declared into the UK to ensure all goods are appropriately controlled.

“This is a significant reform which backs our businesses to compete and grow, controls safety and flow of goods at our border, and keeps the UK in line with our international partners.”

For Britain’s retailers, the principle is now settled. The fight, increasingly, is over the clock.

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Tax crackdown on Shein and Temu could be fast-tracked as retailers turn up the heat

There are few sharper symbols of how brutally the British grocery market has reshaped itself over the past decade than this: Morrisons, once one of the proud “big four”, has been overtaken by Lidl in the league table of the nation’s largest supermarkets.

The Bradford-based grocer reported that group like-for-like sales rose 2.2 per cent in the three months to the end of April, a slowdown from the 2.8 per cent growth it posted in the opening quarter of the year. Total sales edged up 1.7 per cent to £4 billion over the period, lifted, the company said, by fresh food promotions tied to Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and Easter. Underlying earnings (Ebitda) for the first half climbed 5.7 per cent to £323 million.

Steady enough numbers in isolation. The problem for Morrisons is what was happening elsewhere on the shelf.

According to Worldpanel by Numerator, Lidl held 8.6 per cent of the UK grocery market in the 12 weeks to 17 May, nudging ahead of Morrisons on 8.3 per cent and claiming the title of Britain’s fifth-largest grocer. For a chain that controlled barely more than 1 per cent of the market at the turn of the millennium, it is a remarkable ascent, and one we have tracked closely as Lidl crossed the threshold.

Morrisons, predictably, is not minded to concede the point. The grocer argued that the Worldpanel figures “underestimate” its true position because they exclude convenience stores. A spokesman added that the chain had “maintained our share while not opening new supermarkets, unlike the discounters who continue to add significant new space”. There is data to support the pushback: separate figures from NIQ put Morrisons on 8.5 per cent for the same window, just ahead of Lidl’s 8.3 per cent. The trade bible The Grocer noted that the two are now running neck and neck, the precise ranking depending on whose tape measure you trust.

Either way, the direction of travel is unmistakable, and it lands at an awkward moment.

Rami Baitiéh, who has led the recovery effort since the end of 2023, struck a measured note. The grocer was operating in a “highly competitive market”, he said, and remained focused on delivering “the best value for customers”.

The competitive backdrop is only half the story. Morrisons has been labouring under a heavy debt load since the American private equity group Clayton Dubilier & Rice acquired it in 2021, a deal that piled £6.6 billion of borrowings onto its balance sheet. The strain still shows in the statutory accounts: the group booked a pre-tax loss of £381 million in its latest financial year, a modest improvement on the £414 million loss the year before.

There has been genuine progress on the debt itself. Net debt has fallen 46 per cent to £3.17 billion since 2022, helped along by redundancies and the sale of stores and petrol forecourts. The company now operates around 500 supermarkets alongside a clutch of convenience outlets. Baitiéh, who has described the recovery as a “marathon”, says he is seeing “green shoots every single day”.

One asset Morrisons appears determined to hold onto is its food production arm. It remains the only major UK supermarket group to own its entire food manufacturing supply chain, processing roughly a quarter of the fresh food sold in its aisles. The division, Myton Food Group, runs about 10 sites across the country turning out eggs, meat, chilled food, flowers, seafood, produce and baked goods.

Speculation over its future has rumbled on. The Telegraph reported earlier this year that Morrisons was weighing a sale of the unit as the conflict in Iran stoked inflation fears among British businesses. The Grocer countered that the company was “not in serious negotiations” to sell Myton. Baitiéh himself was unequivocal in January, calling the manufacturing operation the “DNA of Morrisons”, adding that “it’s going to stay”. Rather than offload it, the grocer has been courting rival supermarkets to take supply from Myton, turning a cost centre into a potential revenue stream.

Like much of the sector, Morrisons has been vocal about the burden of government-imposed costs, singling out a £75 million annual hit from the rise in employer national insurance contributions. It is a complaint echoed across the high street, with Tesco among those urging ministers to ease the pressure as input inflation and geopolitical uncertainty cloud the outlook.

Baitiéh said the supermarket continued to “monitor the impact of input inflation very closely and we remain committed to doing whatever we can to help keep prices down for customers”. He has previously argued that rising prices “particularly affect pensioners and other less affluent groups, which comprise a significant proportion of our Morrisons customer base”.

For all the pressure, the tone from the top was upbeat on prospects. The grocer had made an “encouraging start” to the third quarter, Baitiéh said, with “strong plans in place to make the most of the World Cup and Father’s Day”. Whether that is enough to halt the discounters’ march, or simply to slow it, will define the next chapter of a turnaround that is far from finished.

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Morrisons feels the squeeze as Lidl edges ahead in the supermarket pecking order

Jeff Bezos has thrown his weight behind one of Cambridge’s most closely watched artificial intelligence ventures, joining a $400 million fundraising that values materials-discovery specialist CuspAI at $2.6 billion.

The Amazon founder is backing the company through Bezos Expeditions, the private investment vehicle he created in 2005 to manage his fortune and which has previously taken stakes in Twitter, Uber and Airbnb. According to the Financial Times, which first reported the deal, Bezos is investing alongside Kleiner Perkins, the Silicon Valley venture capital firm. The round more than quadruples the valuation CuspAI carried last September, when it was worth $520 million.

CuspAI was founded in 2024 by Chad Edwards, who had previously built a quantum computing unicorn, and Max Welling, a professor of machine learning at the University of Amsterdam. Its advisory bench is formidable: it counts among its counsel Yann LeCun and Geoffrey Hinton, the 2024 Nobel laureate often described as a godfather of modern AI, two of the most influential researchers in the field.

The company’s pitch is, in essence, a search engine for matter. Rather than relying on the slow, costly trial and error that has long defined materials science, CuspAI lets customers specify the properties they need, then uses its models to assemble candidate molecular and atomic structures and test them inside a digital simulation. The promise is a development cycle measured in months rather than decades.

That ambition is already drawing serious customers. ASML and Meta are among the businesses using the platform to hunt for new materials, and last month CuspAI said it had worked with Kemira, a Finnish chemicals group, on materials capable of stripping so-called “forever chemicals” from water. Kemira is now pressing ahead with 20 candidates, having sifted through 300 trillion possible structures over six months, a scale of exploration that would be unthinkable by conventional laboratory methods.

The raise lands amid a striking run of form for British AI. It follows substantial rounds for PhysicsX and for Ineffable Intelligence, the London venture that recently secured Europe’s largest-ever seed round. In the first quarter of this year, UK AI start-ups raised $5.8 billion between them, more than France, Germany and the Netherlands combined, a figure that lends fresh credibility to ministers’ claims that Britain can compete at the frontier.

Bezos himself has been making the case for the technology in unusually bullish terms. Speaking at a conference in Paris, he dismissed fears that AI would render workers obsolete. “I know there’s a lot of concern that many people have, including many smart people, that AI is going to make humans redundant and so on,” he said. “I totally disagree with this point of view. I think, in fact, AI is going to create a labour shortage.” It is a theme that runs through his wider portfolio of bets on applied AI, from scientific research to the engineering-focused venture Project Prometheus he has been quietly assembling.

For Cambridge, the deal is further evidence that the cluster’s reputation for deep science is translating into the kind of capital that keeps fast-growing companies on British soil, a concern that has shadowed the sector even as investment in homegrown AI infrastructure accelerates. For the broader economy, it is a reminder that the next generation of AI value may lie not in chatbots but in the unglamorous, high-stakes business of inventing the materials on which physical industries depend.

CuspAI declined to comment. Kleiner Perkins and Bezos Expeditions did not respond to a request for comment.

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Bezos bets on Cambridge as Cuspai’s AI materials hunt hits $2.6bn

Manchester has been named the leading UK city outside London to start a business, according to new research from National Women’s Enterprise Week, in findings that point to the growing pull of regional “hidden hubs” for women building companies away from the capital.

The survey of 1,000 female entrepreneurs found that 41 per cent named Manchester as either the best or second-best UK city outside London to launch a venture, with one in four (27 per cent) putting it in top spot. Birmingham followed on 14 per cent, with Liverpool on 5 per cent.

The picture that emerges is of women-led enterprise increasingly being built beyond the M25, with founders citing lower costs, greater flexibility and stronger regional opportunity as reasons to stay put. It is a trend already visible elsewhere in the country, with female entrepreneurship booming in the North East as well as across the North West.

National Women’s Enterprise Week was founded by Alison Cork MBE as a UK-wide campaign to help close the gender gap in business ownership. Around one in five UK businesses is currently woman-led, a figure that has climbed from 16 per cent in 2018 but still lags well behind the ambition set out in the government-backed Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, which set a target of nearly 600,000 more women founders by 2030.

The research, carried out by Sapio Research, set out to test whether funding, visibility and networks are keeping pace with where women-led businesses are actually being built. While London remains a critical centre for finance and dealmaking, the findings suggest that London-centric assumptions about growth risk disadvantaging founders who are choosing, deliberately, to build viable businesses elsewhere.

More than half (52 per cent) of women entrepreneurs agree that building a business outside London offers greater opportunity, while the same proportion say lower costs are among the top benefits of basing a company beyond the capital.

Yet the old hierarchy has not gone away. Nearly six in ten (58 per cent) agree that businesses based in London are taken more seriously than those outside it, and 61 per cent believe a London address signals that a business is well-established or successful. Perception, in other words, has not caught up with practice.

If anything, that bias runs deeper among those writing the cheques. A separate survey of 200 business investors who have backed UK firms found that 78 per cent agree London-based businesses are taken more seriously, while 80 per cent say a London address signals success. More than half (52 per cent) have at some point required or encouraged a company they invest in to relocate to the capital.

Among women founders based outside London, more than a third (37 per cent) say they have felt pressure to move in order to grow. The majority, though, have no wish to leave: 76 per cent say that, if funding, visibility and opportunity were equal across the UK, they would still choose to base their business exactly where it is today.

That tension, between where capital expects success to happen and where founders are choosing to build it, sits at the heart of the funding debate. It is a theme that runs through wider concerns about the gender finance gap, including evidence that women founders secure 25 per cent less than men at exit.

Alison Cork, founder of National Women’s Enterprise Week, said Manchester topping the list was significant, but that the bigger story lay in what it revealed about the changing geography of British enterprise.

“Women are building ambitious businesses in cities, towns and communities across the country, not just in London,” she said. “The opportunity is already there, but visibility, networks and investment have not always kept pace.

“What this research reveals is a tension between where founders see opportunity and where many people still believe success is supposed to happen. We need to stop thinking of regional growth as an alternative to London and start recognising it as a major driver of the UK’s entrepreneurial economy.”

That argument aligns with the direction of national policy. The government’s Women-Led High-Growth Enterprise Taskforce has likewise pressed for investment and support to reach female founders wherever they are based, rather than concentrating opportunity in the South East.

The research also underlines how much support remains out of reach. Only 35 per cent of women entrepreneurs say they have all the access and backing they need, while 42 per cent say they have some but could do with more. A lack of funding and low visibility are the joint top challenges founders face in growing a business from their current location, each cited by 27 per cent, echoing the squeeze that has seen some female entrepreneurs take on second jobs as 2025 pressures grow.

The findings are being released to coincide with National Women’s Enterprise Week’s Own It: Speed Mentoring for Female Founders event on 19 June 2026, which is built around improving access to practical support, mentoring, networks and visibility for women founders across the UK.

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Manchester crowned best city outside London for women founders as the entrepreneurial map shifts north

Britain’s small and medium-sized businesses are quietly rewiring the way they operate, and the trigger is no longer the calendar quarter but the fixture list. From tennis fortnights to stadium residencies and a summer of football, a growing “event economy” is reshaping local trading conditions for thousands of firms, and the smartest operators are planning for it months in advance.

For businesses clustered around stadiums, parks and city-centre entertainment hubs, the pattern is familiar: a sudden, concentrated wave of footfall that tests customer flow, venue capacity and day-to-day operations all at once. New insight from insurer Hiscox suggests these spikes are becoming more frequent, more geographically spread and, crucially, more predictable, which means they can be planned for rather than simply survived.

This summer’s football tournament is shaping up to be one of the single largest short-term jolts to UK hospitality demand in years. Some 40 per cent of consumers already plan to book a venue or buy tickets to watch the action, and 47 per cent say they would pay extra for a prime viewing spot. Separate analysis points to an £898m boost for the sector, with roughly 12.4 million fans expected to pour into pubs, bars and restaurants over the course of the tournament. It is a windfall that lands after a punishing few years for hospitality, and one Business Matters has tracked closely as UK pubs, bookmakers and takeaways eye a multibillion-pound spending boost.

There is a regulatory tailwind, too. During knockout fixtures involving the home nations, pubs will be permitted to extend trading hours, staying open until 1am for matches kicking off between 5pm and 9pm, and until 2am for later kick-offs between 9pm and 10pm. The relaxation, set out in The Licensing Act 2003 (FIFA World Cup licensing hours) Order 2026, applies automatically to licensed premises when a home nation reaches the relevant stages, sparing operators the usual scramble for individual Temporary Event Notices.

Simon Ratcliff, Commercial Property and Liability Underwriting Manager at Hiscox, says the operational upside comes with strings attached. “Major tournaments like this year’s summer of football can create sudden and significant changes in how SMEs operate, particularly where businesses adapt their venues for live screenings or experience concentrated demand during match periods,” he says. “This can introduce considerations around venue capacity, customer flow, health and safety procedures and licensing requirements, particularly where businesses are operating later than usual or changing how they normally trade.”

The MATCH framework: a tournament playbook for SMEs

The appetite is already showing up in search data. Queries for “where to watch the World Cup” are up 880 per cent over the past month, according to Google search analysis, while searches for “World Cup screening” have climbed 153 per cent over the same period.

To help businesses convert that interest into well-run, profitable trading, Hiscox is urging SMEs to think MATCH:

M – Monitor demand peaks around fixtures and key match times.

A – Adjust staffing levels ahead of high-attendance games.

T – Track whether temporary changes such as screens, outdoor areas or extended hours are covered under your public liability insurance arrangements, and check that turnover projections remain accurate as trading increases.

C – Control capacity and customer flow to manage queues and congestion.

H – Handle health, safety and licensing requirements for late-night trading and alcohol service.

Ratcliff flags one detail that catches operators out. “If hiring screens or audio-visual equipment for the tournament, venues should check whether hire agreements make them responsible for insuring the equipment while it’s in their care,” he says. “Many AV hire companies have ‘continuing hire charges’, meaning the venue could be liable for any damages, along with lost rental income while items are out of use.”

The rise of the ‘event economy’

The tournament is the headline act, but it is only one date in a far busier diary. SMEs are increasingly operating inside a broader, more sustained event economy that runs the length of the year.

Between June and December alone, the calendar takes in sporting fixtures from Wimbledon and Royal Ascot to Henley Royal Regatta and major football; stadium concerts including Harry Styles’ 12-night Wembley residency across June and July; and a national circuit of music festivals, from Download at Donington Park and Tramlines in Sheffield to TRNSMT in Glasgow, Creamfields in Cheshire, Green Man in Wales and Boardmasters in Cornwall. London adds its own layer, with BST Hyde Park, Notting Hill Carnival, Pride, Taste of London and Wing Fest, the world’s largest chicken wing festival, returning to London Stadium in July 2026. Then come the seasonal staples, from local fireworks displays to Christmas markets.

As these events grow more frequent and more widely dispersed, the planning challenge changes shape. Businesses are no longer bracing for one-off peaks but managing cyclical spikes that recur throughout the year, much as coastal and seasonal firms have long done. It is the same dynamic that saw the summer economy valued at billions and tens of thousands of jobs, now playing out in city centres and stadium districts.

For Ed Savitt, owner of DropShot Coffee in SW19, the tennis championships are not a fortnight of matches but one of the most operationally demanding stretches of the year. As tens of thousands of fans, tourists and media teams descend on the area each summer, the small independent shop turns into a high-pressure operation that takes months to plan.

“Wimbledon completely changes the pace of business for us. We now prepare months in advance across staffing, stock and planning,” Savitt told Hiscox. “Temporary setups require detailed planning around logistics, staffing and approvals, as well as additional operational considerations we don’t normally deal with day-to-day. We also introduced clearer queue systems, adjusted layouts and carried out additional risk assessments to manage crowding and maintain safe working conditions.”

For Common Pizza, the summer calendar brings more than warmer weather. With sites near both Clapham Common and Parsons Green, the pizza and live music chain sits next door to everything from large-scale festivals to Polo in the Park, each bringing its own wave of footfall and timing pressures.

“We see a noticeable uplift in footfall during major summer events on Clapham Common, with customers often spending more time in the area before and after events,” a general manager at Common Pizza told Hiscox. “For Polo in the Park, we expected increased demand during peak arrival and departure times, so we reviewed stock levels and ensured operations were prepared for busier trading periods. The biggest challenge is maintaining service quality while responding quickly to changing demand throughout the day.”

That mix of caution and opportunity reflects the wider mood across hospitality, where operators are weighing a welcome demand boost against thin margins and stubborn costs, a balance the sector knows well as the hospitality sector raises a cautious toast to returning pubgoers. The fundamentals of the tournament economics are encouraging, with the BBC reporting that pubs banked a significant trade boost during England’s recent run at the Euros.

For Ratcliff, the bigger shift is structural. “Major events are increasingly shaping how SMEs plan and operate throughout the year, particularly for businesses located near venues, parks and city event spaces,” he concludes. “What were once considered isolated busy periods are now becoming more regular operational challenges for many SMEs, requiring more proactive planning around how they manage demand, space and safety.”

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SMEs told to think ‘MATCH’ as a summer of football fuels Britain’s booming event economy

The UK’s 100 largest businesses are made up of more than 37,000 individual entities registered with Companies House, new analysis has found, laying bare just how hard it has become to see the full shape of Britain’s biggest firms through the corporate registry alone.

The research, from company intelligence platform Beauhurst, sets out the tangle of legal structures that routinely prevent governments, advisers and investors from grasping how the country’s largest organisations actually operate. In the most extreme cases, a single business is registered with Companies House as more than 3,800 separate entities.

Firms use multiple legal entities for all manner of legitimate reasons, from regulatory and financial compliance to ringfencing different parts of the business and smoothing the path for mergers and acquisitions. The trouble, as the analysis makes clear, is that this fragmentation scatters the most meaningful information about a business across dozens, hundreds or even thousands of registrations, making it far harder to obtain and consolidate.

The findings come at a moment of heightened scrutiny of the corporate register itself, with the size of the Companies House register having recently shrunk for the first time in more than a decade as identity-verification reforms take hold.

Beauhurst, which bills itself as the UK’s leading platform for private company intelligence, carried out the analysis using True Companies, a newly launched data suite that aims to show businesses as they genuinely operate, regardless of how many legal entities sit behind them. The tool stitches together fragmented information held across corporate registries, patents, grants, funding records, acquisitions, news and company websites to build a single, unified view of an organisation.

The patent figures are perhaps the most striking illustration of the problem. Only 29 of the top 100 businesses hold patents in their primary legal entity, yet more than 50 own patents elsewhere within their wider corporate structure. In other words, the innovation activity of half of the UK’s largest businesses would be missed entirely if only the parent company were examined. The same blind spot extends to the accounts: nearly 90,000 UK businesses file their most meaningful financial data through a subsidiary rather than their main registered company, and 15 per cent of the country’s largest firms hold key financial data outside the legal entity they are most associated with.

Toby Austin, founder and chief executive of Beauhurst, said the scale of the issue had long been underestimated. “For decades, company intelligence has been constrained by legal entities, and our analysis with True Companies sets out the scale of the problem. A business’s employees, intellectual property, funding, acquisitions, financial performance and innovation activity are often spread across multiple entities and, as a result, some of the most important signals about a business are hidden in plain sight,” he said.

“Having multiple legal entities is useful for registration and compliance, but it’s not how people think about businesses and it’s not how economies work. True Companies changes that by connecting these entities and bringing together information from across multiple sources for the first time. This creates a complete picture of a business that opens up entirely new possibilities. Governments can gain a more accurate understanding of their economies. Investors can identify opportunities sooner, advisers can provide better guidance, and organisations can finally understand businesses as they actually exist, rather than as they appear on a registry.”

For the public sector, Beauhurst argues, a clearer view could help local and national government pinpoint economic strengths and weaknesses across regions, track major employers, map innovation clusters and target support more effectively. For investors and advisers, it offers the prospect of spotting emerging growth opportunities earlier, assessing risk more accurately and understanding the full extent of a company’s activities, investments and intellectual property.

It is a reminder that the 5.5 million-odd companies sitting on the Companies House register tell only part of the story. Through True Companies, Beauhurst says, users can pull together complete financial information, key people, funding history, acquisitions, news and patents across all of a business’s registered companies, surfacing growth trends, innovation signals and expansion activity that would otherwise stay buried across disconnected entities.

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The UK’s 100 biggest businesses hide behind 37,000 company registrations

Britain stands to forfeit £250 billion in economic value over the next decade, a sum equivalent to 8 per cent of current GDP, unless ministers act decisively to bring down the country’s stubbornly high energy costs.

That is the stark warning from a new report by PwC, which argues that persistently high industrial electricity prices are blunting Britain’s competitiveness and acting as a drag on growth right across the economy.

A heavy reliance on imported energy, combined with the marginal-pricing system under which gas typically sets the price of power, has left Britain saddled with the highest electricity costs in the G7, the group of large economies that also takes in France, Germany and the United States. A larger share of policy costs, including renewables subsidies and grid upgrades, is also loaded onto British bills than is the case elsewhere.

Rising wholesale gas prices since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have widened the gap between the UK and other leading economies, the report found, a gulf that peaked at 63 per cent in 2024. The strain has been felt most acutely by energy-intensive industries, with UK steelmakers among those facing some of the steepest price gaps against European rivals.

About half of the investors PwC surveyed cited electricity costs and infrastructure planning as priority areas for improvement, with energy security fast becoming, in the firm’s words, “a defining factor in economic competitiveness and growth”. The concern is borne out by the numbers: industrial electricity prices in Britain now run well above the median across International Energy Agency member countries, leaving domestic manufacturers at a clear disadvantage.

The competitive squeeze is already prompting firms to vote with their feet. A survey by Make UK, the manufacturers’ lobby group, found that a quarter of British manufacturers had either moved some operations overseas or were weighing up doing so, because high energy costs at home were rendering them “uncompetitive”. Nine per cent had already begun outsourcing more of their production abroad, the group reported, while a further 16 per cent were considering joining them, a trend Business Matters has tracked as the exodus gathers pace.

Energy-intensive industries have the most to gain from lower costs, but Simon Oates, of PwC UK, noted that “frontier” technology firms and power-hungry data centres are set to become ever larger consumers. That, he suggested, could mean considerably more than £250 billion is unlocked by tackling the problem.

PwC is calling on the government to lead a national energy plan, drawn up alongside businesses and investors, that assesses the country’s needs and sets out how they can be met. The energy crisis triggered by the war in the Middle East, said Vicky Parker, of PwC UK, represented an “inflection point”. As she put it: “If action isn’t taken off the back of this one, that’s probably a missed opportunity.”

The study suggested that some of the policy costs levied on bills should be reallocated, to balance “long-term energy security objectives with the need for price competitiveness in the short term”. The government, Oates argued, also needed to “reset the rulebook around regulation”, which too often “comes through an affordability lens”.

“What we’re missing is that one of the challenges that is in place to affordability is that we have a highly volatile electricity price, and if you get the growth, you get real wage growth, which is an unlock to affordability,” he said. Greater cohesion between regulators, including on environmental and planning matters, could likewise help to bolster confidence and draw in fresh investment, the report suggested.

The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said: “The lesson of yet another fossil fuel crisis is the UK needs to get off the fossil fuel rollercoaster and onto clean homegrown power we control to bring energy security and lower bills for good.”

It added that the government was “taking action to tackle the challenges our industries face through our modern industrial strategy”, including cutting electricity costs by up to 25 per cent for more than 10,000 manufacturing businesses through its British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme, a move Business Matters reported when it was unveiled. Whether that proves enough to keep British industry from drifting overseas, however, remains the open question.

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Britain risks losing £250bn unless it grips the highest energy bills in the G7

Mark Dixon, one of Britain’s most enduring entrepreneurs, is to step aside as chief executive of International Workplace Group nearly four decades after he founded the company.

Christian Schmitz, a former McKinsey partner and onetime director at the private equity firm KKR, will succeed Dixon in the top job, IWG confirmed in a statement to the stock market. Schmitz joined the group last year as chief transformation officer before being promoted to global head of all regions.

Dixon, 66, will move up to executive chairman, a role in which he will “continue to provide strategic guidance to the board and act as an advisor to the CEO”, the company said. He still owns just over a quarter of the shares in IWG, and the board framed his new position as a way to “maintain Mark Dixon’s unrivalled industry knowledge, experience and long-term strategic perspective through an orderly CEO transition process”.

IWG is the world’s largest provider of flexible workspace and sits behind a stable of brands including Regus, Spaces and Signature. The group operates more than 4,000 locations across some 120 countries, a footprint that has expanded sharply as employers have embraced hybrid working. The shift has been good for business: demand for flexible space recently drove IWG’s revenues to a record £3.3 billion.

Dixon founded the business in Brussels in 1989, at the age of 29. The idea came to him after watching businesspeople hold meetings in coffee shops and concluding that the traditional office was overdue for a rethink. That hunch has since reshaped how millions of people work, and the rise of serviced offices built for hybrid working has kept the model firmly in fashion.

He is one of the few people in Britain to have built a business worth more than £1 billion, and one of the longest-serving chief executives across the FTSE 100 and FTSE 250, of which IWG is a constituent. The company is valued at about £1.8 billion on the stock market. Dixon’s stake leaves him with a personal fortune of £931 million, according to the latest Sunday Times Rich List.

His route to the top was anything but conventional. Dixon left school at 16 to start a business, and by the time he launched IWG, then called Regus, he had already tried his hand at selling sandwiches and running a bakery.

The company he created has weathered more than one storm. After rapid growth through the 1990s, it was badly hit by the dotcom crash in the early 2000s, when many of the start-ups renting its desks went bust. Its US arm entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy and Dixon was forced to sell a stake in the UK business, though he later regained control and bought the operations back. More recently he has trimmed his holding, selling £68.5 million of shares to repay a bank loan.

Dixon cast the leadership change as a long-term bet on the company’s future rather than a retreat. “This is an investment in the future. I am a very significant investor in the business and I want to get the right management to take it forward to the next stage,” he said. “It’s about succession planning, doing the right thing for the company and for the company’s future. We are doing very well. There is lots of opportunity, but you need the right management team and the right leadership to take it to the next level.”

He praised Schmitz for his “superb leadership skills and lots of experience”.

Asked what had been the key to building IWG, Dixon returned to a single word: perseverance. “You’ve got to persevere. If you look at the history of the company, it’s the management of capital and perseverance from the beginning,” he said. “It’s also about hiring the right people. That’s what we’re doing here with the investment in Christian. It’s not a one-man activity, it’s always about people.”

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Mark Dixon hands the reins of his Regus empire to a new chief after nearly 40 years

American Express has agreed to buy TheFork, the restaurant booking app owned by Tripadvisor, for $700 million, in a move that hands the card giant one of Europe’s largest dining platforms and a firmer foothold in its fastest-growing market.

The all-cash deal, announced by American Express, will lift the group’s bookable dining network to 75,000 venues and reinforce an international business that has outpaced the rest of the company for years. The transaction is expected to complete by the end of 2026, subject to regulatory approval.

For Amex, dining has become far more than a perk. Rafa Marquez, president of international card services, said owning TheFork would strengthen the group’s ability to put its members in front of the restaurants they want. “Dining is one of the most important ways people engage with our brand,” he said. “TheFork has built a successful platform across Europe with strong relationships throughout the restaurant industry that would complement our existing capabilities.”

The purchase is the latest step in a dining strategy that Amex has been building for the best part of a decade. It bought the reservations platform Resy in 2019, which now offers cardholders early notifications and access to hard-to-get tables, and two years ago completed a $400 million acquisition of Tock, a booking business first launched in 2014. The group has also been broadening its small-business proposition and, through its restaurant grant programme, has positioned itself as a backer of independent operators at a difficult moment for the sector.

Founded in Paris in 2007, TheFork lets diners find and book tables online and works with more than 50,000 restaurants across 11 European countries, including the UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy. Almir Ambeskovic, its chief executive, said the company was created “to help restaurants thrive and to make it easier for diners to discover and enjoy great restaurants”. He added: “American Express shares our commitment to innovation, service and hospitality. Together, we have a unique opportunity to accelerate our mission, bringing even more value to restaurants while creating richer and more seamless experiences for millions of diners across Europe.”

The sale comes after sustained pressure on Tripadvisor, which has struggled to shake off pandemic-era disruption and competition from rivals such as Booking Holdings and Airbnb, as well as newer entrants reshaping the online booking market, including Google’s AI-powered reservation tool. The activist investor Starboard Value had pushed the company to sell TheFork, which it has owned since 2014. Jeff Smith, Starboard’s chief executive, argued last October that TheFork was the least-integrated and easiest part of the business to break off, before the hedge fund grew more agitated in February, criticising the pace of Tripadvisor’s strategic review and urging management to explore a sale of the whole company.

Stephen Squeri, chairman and chief executive of American Express, said he was “excited about the opportunity to deepen our relationship with Tripadvisor”, adding that the two firms could “create even greater value for customers and partners” across dining, travel and experiences. Matt Goldberg, Tripadvisor’s chief executive, said the deal reflected “the tangible value” across the group’s portfolio.

The market reaction was positive on both sides. Tripadvisor shares, which have fallen more than 65 per cent over five years, closed up 1.2 per cent in New York on Monday night, while American Express shares ended the day 3.1 per cent higher.

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American Express buys TheFork from Tripadvisor in $700m bet on European dining

President Trump has reopened his long-running feud with Paris, warning that he will slap a 100 per cent tariff on French wine and champagne unless President Macron abandons France’s digital services tax, the 3 per cent levy that falls most heavily on America’s biggest technology firms.

The threat lands just as Trump prepares to travel to France for the G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains, setting up a tense encounter between two leaders who have spent years alternately courting and clashing with one another. Macron’s response was blunt. Told of the ultimatum, he said simply: “That’s not how it works.”

In an interview with the New York Post, Trump framed the matter as a straightforward act of retaliation. “I asked him not to charge American companies and if they do, I have no choice but to charge a 100 per cent tariff on all champagnes and all wines coming out of France,” he said. “All he has to do is get rid of the sales tax and he wouldn’t have that kind of pressure.”

Speaking to the French broadcaster TF1, Macron argued that any fresh increase on French wine would breach the trade settlement struck between Trump and Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission. “We have just concluded an agreement between Europe and the US on tariffs. Now we need stability,” he said. “This digital services tax, the Europeans decided it and several countries have implemented it. It’s part of our law. It is not for the US to decide on French and European law.”

He added that he was prepared for “a respectful but firm discussion”, while insisting France would not be bounced into rewriting its own statute book. Tariffs, he said, “are no good for anyone”, least of all between G7 partners, because they fail to fix America’s trade position and push up prices for consumers on both sides of the Atlantic.

For France’s winemakers and distillers, the stakes are anything but abstract. Producers shipped €2.9 billion of wines and spirits to the United States in the 12 months to April, making America comfortably the sector’s largest single market — worth 18 per cent of all French wine and spirit exports, ahead of the United Kingdom on 11 per cent and Germany on 6 per cent. Alcohol remains a meaningful contributor to the national accounts, adding €14.3 billion to France’s trade balance in 2024, according to French Customs.

That exposure helps explain the alarm in the trade. Gabriel Picard, chairman of the French Federation of Wine and Spirits Exporters, called for the preservation of a “balanced and constructive trading relationship between France and the US in the interests of both economies”. His caution is well founded: French wine and spirits exports have already lost their fizz, with sales to the US falling sharply through 2025 as successive rounds of duties bit. A jump to triple-digit tariffs would turn a difficult year into an existential one for many smaller châteaux and négociants that depend on American distributors.

None of this is new. Trump first reached for the wine bottle as a weapon in 2019, during his first term, when France introduced the digital services tax. “It might be on wine, it might be on something else,” he warned at the time, before threatening duties on €2.4 billion of French imports including cheese, champagne and handbags. In January he floated a 200 per cent levy on French wine after Macron declined to join the so-called Board of Peace, the US administration’s vehicle for rebuilding Gaza and brokering an end to conflicts elsewhere.

There is already a 15 per cent tariff on French wine and champagne, in line with the wider trade deal agreed between Washington and Brussels that capped duties on most EU goods. The repeated escalation, from threats of 200 per cent earlier in the year to this latest 100 per cent salvo, is becoming a recognisable pattern, one British exporters have learned to read closely given how often Trump’s wine threats spill into the broader transatlantic trade picture.

The digital services tax that so irritates Washington is narrowly drawn but pointedly aimed. It obliges firms with digital-services sales of at least €750 million worldwide, and at least €25 million in France, to hand over 3 per cent of their French revenue under a levy designed to capture the largest technology platforms. The intended targets are American giants such as Google and Amazon, though the net also catches non-US operators including the Netherlands’ Booking.com and China’s Alibaba.

For Macron, the principle matters as much as the money. Several European governments have adopted similar measures, Britain’s own version has drawn hundreds of millions of pounds from US tech groups since its introduction, and conceding to Washington over French law would set an awkward precedent for the bloc as a whole. With both leaders dug in and the G7 cameras about to roll, the champagne corks in Evian may stay firmly in place.

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Trump threatens 100% tariff on French wine as Macron digs in over digital tax

Canada’s Cohere is tripling its physical footprint in the UK, signing a lease on a new London office as it races to position itself as the credible alternative to American rivals OpenAI and Anthropic for governments and regulated businesses nervous about handing their data to Silicon Valley.

The artificial intelligence start-up will move into a 14,000 sq ft office at 100 New Oxford Street later this year, leaving its current home in Soho. The new site has room for up to 100 staff, against roughly 80 today, and gives the company a far larger shopfront in the capital as demand for so-called “sovereign AI” accelerates.

Founded in 2019, Cohere builds large language models tailored to businesses and governments rather than consumers. Its co-founder and chief executive, Aidan Gomez, is among the most influential AI researchers in the world, having helped develop the “transformer” architecture that underpins virtually every modern large language model, including the systems built by his much larger American competitors.

The expansion is the latest sign that the global AI land grab has firmly reached London. It follows OpenAI’s decision to open its first permanent London office in King’s Cross, a site with capacity to more than double its headcount to 544, while Anthropic plans to quadruple its own London presence just a few streets away from its bitter rival.

Where the American giants compete on raw capability, Cohere is selling reassurance. The company promises not to retain customer data and offers models that can be deployed on-premises or inside private clouds, an approach designed to appeal to governments and heavily regulated sectors such as finance, defence and healthcare. Its UK customers already include Reuters, the Aston Martin Formula One team and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.

That pitch was sharpened in April when Cohere acquired the German start-up Aleph Alpha to create what it called a “transatlantic AI powerhouse”, pitched squarely at European customers wary of depending on US developers. The combined group was valued at around $20bn.

“By expanding our London footprint threefold, we’re positioning ourselves at the heart of the UK’s sovereign AI revolution, where government and enterprise interest in secure artificial intelligence is accelerating,” Gomez said.

Sovereign AI refers to a state or organisation’s ability to develop, deploy and govern AI tools independently, without relying on foreign infrastructure. It has climbed rapidly up the political agenda amid mounting concern that Europe is dangerously dependent on US models and cloud providers. Building “sovereign” capability is now a stated priority for both the UK government, which has stood up a dedicated £500m Sovereign AI unit to back home-grown firms, and the European Union, which launched its technology sovereignty legislation earlier this month.

The numbers help explain the rush. McKinsey estimates that sovereignty requirements could shape between $500bn and $600bn of AI spending by 2030, as much as a third of the entire market.

Kanishka Narayan, the minister for AI and online safety, welcomed the move. “Cohere’s focus on sovereign AI, helping businesses and government deploy this technology securely, on their own terms, is exactly the kind of capability we are building in Britain,” he said.

For all the political enthusiasm, the sovereign AI story is not without its sceptics. The same security promise that makes these models attractive can cut the other way: regulators have begun to warn that even tightly controlled enterprise systems can expose systemic weaknesses in sensitive sectors such as banking. For Cohere, convincing Whitehall and the City that “sovereign” genuinely means safer will matter every bit as much as the square footage on New Oxford Street.

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Cohere triples its London base to cash in on Britain’s sovereign AI bet

Downing Street is pressing the White House for an exemption from a sweeping American export ban that has stripped British users of access to Anthropic’s most advanced artificial intelligence.

After President Trump blocked foreign access to Claude Fable 5 and Mythos 5, two versions of the company’s newest and most capable model, No 10 officials began working the phones across the US administration in search of a UK carve-out. So far the lobbying has produced little. Officials in Washington remain wary that the technology carries security risks once it travels beyond America’s borders.

“There is an effort to seek an exemption, but there are security issues to consider,” said one figure with knowledge of the talks.

For Britain’s businesses, the episode is a sharp lesson in how quickly access to critical infrastructure can be switched off by a decision taken thousands of miles away. The same Mythos model now at the centre of the row had already set off crisis meetings among finance ministers and central bankers earlier this year over its uncanny ability to surface vulnerabilities in widely used software.

The US Department of War has taken the toughest line of all, tearing up a defence contract with Anthropic. The White House, by contrast, had been viewed as the more pragmatic actor — until officials concluded the company had failed to allay their concerns about the new model and moved to drastic action.

Anthropic announced on Friday that all foreign nationals, including its own overseas employees, would be barred from using the model. The company said the government believed there was a method of “jailbreaking”, or bypassing, Fable 5’s safeguards.

“To date, the government has only given us verbal evidence of a potential narrow, non-universal jailbreak, which essentially consists of asking the model to read a specific codebase and fix any software flaws,” Anthropic said. The firm added that it had complied with the legal directive but disagreed with the decision to recall a model relied upon by hundreds of millions of people on the basis of a “narrow potential jailbreak”. “If this standard was applied across the industry, we believe it would essentially halt all new model deployments for all frontier model providers,” it said. Because it could not quickly build nationality-based access controls, the company pulled both Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for users worldwide, Americans included.

The tone from the Pentagon has been unmistakable. On Saturday, Pete Hegseth, the US secretary of war, posted on X: “Three months ago, the Department of War kicked Anthropic out of our building, forever. Every passing day proves why that was the right move.”

For ministers, the affair has crystallised a long-running anxiety about Britain’s dependence on a handful of American AI suppliers. Kanishka Narayan, the UK government’s AI minister, said the ban underlined the importance of building “sovereign AI capability” at home.

“This week, the most advanced AI in the world was cut off for everyone in Britain,” he said. “Not by us, but by a decision taken in another country. We treat every other threat to our sovereignty with deadly seriousness, but we haven’t learnt to treat this one the same way.”

That argument is no longer abstract. The government has already stood up a £500m Sovereign AI fund to back home-grown developers, and private capital is following, with a £1bn push to build Britain’s first fully sovereign AI infrastructure network now under way. The Anthropic ban hands those efforts a powerful new justification, and a warning to every UK firm that has wired a foreign model into its products and processes.

The diplomatic test comes quickly. Sir Keir Starmer is due to meet Trump this week at the G7 summit, where the carve-out is expected to feature in the conversation. For the thousands of British SMEs that have built workflows, customer-service tools and software pipelines around frontier AI, the practical message is blunt: resilience now means knowing exactly which of your suppliers could be switched off overnight, and what you would do the morning it happened.

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Cut off from the world’s most powerful AI, Britain leans on Trump for a way back in

Fox Corporation is buying Roku in a cash-and-share deal worth roughly $22bn (about £16.3bn), a bet that bolting its sports and news output onto America’s best-known streaming platform will shore up its position as audiences drift away from traditional television.

The transaction hands Fox a direct line into the more than 100 million households that already use Roku’s streaming devices and smart-TV software. For a business still heavily dependent on cable distribution, that reach offers two prizes at once: a far richer pool of first-party data with which to target advertising, and a route to market that does not run through the pay-TV bundle it has leaned on for decades.

It is the first major acquisition Lachlan Murdoch has overseen since taking the reins of the empire his father, Rupert, assembled. Murdoch, who chairs both Fox and The Times publisher News Corp, described the deal as a “defining moment” that brings “together the most valuable live content portfolio in video consumption with the preeminent streaming platform through which America watches it”. It is also the latest in a run of outsized media-and-technology tie-ups, coming hot on the heels of Elon Musk’s $80bn merger of X and xAI, as owners race to fuse content, platforms and data under one roof.

“In 2020, we acquired Tubi, and under our stewardship it has become one of the most successful businesses in streaming,” Murdoch said. “Today, we take the next step.” That earlier punt on free, ad-supported television has paid off handsomely: Fox’s decision to launch Tubi in the UK underlined how seriously the group now takes the free-streaming market it once treated as an afterthought.

Investors were less enthusiastic about the price tag. Fox shares slid 8 per cent in pre-market trading as the market digested the cost and the share issuance involved. Roku climbed 2.6 per cent to $147.50, though it remained well shy of the $160-a-share offer, a gap that typically signals lingering doubt over whether a deal will complete on its stated terms.

What Roku brings to the table

Roku was among the first companies to carry services such as Netflix and YouTube onto the television set through connected devices and smart TVs. Its income is driven largely by advertising and by subscription revenue earned from the streaming apps that sit on its platform, and it also runs the free-to-watch Roku Channel. Advertising is the larger engine: the platform business generated $613m of revenue in the first quarter, up 27 per cent year on year.

That trajectory matters because the wider market has been anything but smooth. As cash-strapped UK households cancel streaming subscriptions to trim spending, ad-funded “free” tiers have emerged as the industry’s growth story, exactly the territory where Roku and Tubi are strongest.

Under the agreement, Roku shareholders will receive $96 in cash plus about 0.97 Fox Class A shares for each share they hold. That values the company at $160 a share, a premium of 33.7 per cent to Roku’s closing price on the Thursday before reports emerged that it was weighing its options, a sale among them.

While Fox dominates cable through its sports rights and the top-rated Fox News, its streaming footprint has so far been confined to Tubi. Roku widens that considerably, and the enlarged group expects to become the third-largest player in US television by viewership. Fox shareholders will own roughly 73 per cent of the combined company once the deal closes, with Roku investors holding the balance.

Both boards have approved the transaction, which is expected to complete in the first half of next year, according to reporting by Variety and The Hollywood Reporter.

For SME advertisers and media buyers watching from this side of the Atlantic, the significance is less about the headline figure than about the model it endorses: live content plus a distribution platform plus the data to monetise both. If Murdoch’s wager pays off, the combination of premium live programming and connected-TV reach could reset what advertisers expect to buy, and how cheaply challenger brands can reach a national audience.

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Fox bets $22bn on Roku as Lachlan Murdoch chases the streaming living room

Ministers have set the UK on course to bar under-16s from mainstream social media, but the business and technology figures who will have to live with the policy are far from convinced it will work.

The government confirmed on Monday that platforms including TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, Facebook and X will be required to keep under-16s off their services, with messaging apps such as WhatsApp and the standalone YouTube Kids carved out. The measures, which follow the path already taken by Australia, are expected to come into force by spring 2027, and platforms that fail to take reasonable steps to exclude younger users face fines running into millions of pounds. Nine in ten parents who responded to the official consultation backed a ban.

It is, by any measure, one of the boldest interventions yet in the relationship between children, business and the internet. It is also one of the most contested. The reaction from across the regulatory, fact-checking and age-assurance worlds ranged from outright opposition to heavily qualified support, with a common thread: age limits alone will not fix online harm, and may create fresh problems of their own.

‘Reminiscent of attempts to ban the printing press’

The sharpest criticism came from the free-market Institute of Economic Affairs. Dr Christopher Snowdon, the think tank’s head of lifestyle economics, warned against judging legislation by the good intentions of its champions rather than its likely consequences.

“We know from Australia that most teenagers will get around the ban and that those who are not able to do so will suffer from social isolation,” he said. “There are legitimate concerns about screen addiction among both children and adults, but parents are already able to restrict what their children see online and limit the number of hours they can use a smartphone. These guardrails are removed when kids log in via VPNs or sign up to platforms as adults.”

His verdict was blunt. “What the government is trying to do is reminiscent of attempts to ban the printing press. It is similarly impractical, illiberal and ultimately undesirable.”

‘No silver bullet’

Leanne Proctor, regulatory lead at the Online Responsibility Network, struck a more conciliatory note but reached a similar conclusion, cautioning that the policy “risks letting down the very families it seeks to protect”.

“We understand why so many parents welcome this policy, and we share their concern for children’s safety online,” she said. “The UK would do well to reflect carefully on the experiences of Australia, who identified significant challenges with this approach. Evidence from social media restrictions around the world suggests that age limits alone are unlikely to be a silver bullet in protecting children from online harms, and parents deserve a solution that truly delivers.”

For Proctor, the answer lies in shared responsibility rather than a blanket cut-off. “Every brand and platform has a responsibility in making the internet safer. Our research found the majority of Gen Z firmly believe the responsibility lies with platforms themselves to improve online safety.” The route forward, she argued, is a “multi-stakeholder” model in which platforms deploy effective content monitoring and controls while being regulated quickly and effectively under the Online Safety Act.

A clenched fist, but parents wanted tough measures

Not everyone in the age-assurance industry was hostile. Andy Lulham, chief operating officer at age-verification provider Verifymy, described the announcement as “the government finally showing its hand on social media, and it’s a clenched fist”.

A ban for under-16s, demands that platforms close existing accounts, and restrictions reaching into chatbots and gaming platforms amounted to an approach he called “both bold and blunt”. Yet he acknowledged the political reality. “Parents clearly want tough measures; nine in ten who responded to the official consultation backed a ban, with the UK now joining Australia and a growing number of other countries heading in the same direction.”

Lulham argued the technology is now mature enough to do the job. “While not the approach I would have recommended, lessons will have been learnt from Australia and age-check technology is ready to enforce the new legislation,” he said, pointing to the work platforms have already done keeping children off adult websites since age-assurance duties took effect last July. But he warned that hardware and software alone would fall short: “To reduce harm, the ban needs to be backed by real accountability for platforms, proper support for parents, and education that prepares young people for the online world they’ll eventually rejoin.”

‘A free pass for social media companies’

The most fundamental objection came from the fact-checking charity Full Fact, which framed the ban as a retreat rather than a step forward. Mark Frankel, its head of public affairs, called the announcement “neither bold nor decisive” and “a de facto surrender in the fight against harmful online misinformation”.

Rather than locking under-16s out, Frankel said, ministers should be applying far greater regulatory pressure on technology companies to dismantle addictive design features and placing a statutory duty on them to help users tell fact from fiction. He also flagged an awkward contradiction at the heart of the government’s wider agenda: “If the government is serious about extending participation in our democratic process to 16 and 17-year-olds, restricting their access to these platforms is unlikely to help them become better informed.”

His closing charge was that the policy lets the platforms off the hook entirely. “It’s not the technology itself that is harmful, but the way it’s designed and marketed to all users of these platforms. Far from protecting young people from online harms, this ban fails to address current weaknesses in online safety legislation and gives social media companies a free pass.”

What it means for business

For platform operators, brands and the fast-growing age-assurance sector, the direction of travel is now clear even if the detail is not. Further measures, including possible overnight curfews and limits on infinite scrolling for under-18s, are expected to be set out in July, and the practical burden of compliance will land on businesses, not Whitehall.

The government’s own Online Safety Act explainer and the House of Commons Library briefing on proposals to ban social media for children set out the legislative backdrop against which firms will have to plan. What this week’s reaction makes plain is that even the companies building the tools to enforce the ban doubt it can succeed on its own. The consensus emerging from the industry is that age limits are the easy part; meaningful accountability, parental support and digital education are the hard, unglamorous work that will actually determine whether children are any safer.

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Under-16s social media ban branded ‘impractical, illiberal and undesirable’ as industry rounds on government

There is no escaping the noise around artificial intelligence. Yet behind the breathless launches and boardroom enthusiasm sits a far more sober question, and it is one MPs are now determined to answer: are British businesses, and the workers inside them, actually getting anything out of it?

That question has become harder to dodge over the past two years. Having consulted hundreds of firms the length and breadth of the country, the Business and Trade Committee (BTC) has heard a recurring worry, that the UK is trailing competitor nations when it comes to helping companies, and small firms in particular, put AI to work. The risk is not merely missed efficiency gains. It is the prospect of British business losing the race for competitive edge before it has properly begun.

The flip side is just as instructive. A steady drip of embarrassing headlines, professional consultancies serving up error-strewn reports stuffed with invented citations and references that simply do not exist, has exposed the perils awaiting the unwary early adopter. For every firm quietly banking the benefits, another is discovering that AI without judgement is a liability dressed up as a shortcut.

It is against this backdrop, and as the Government presses ahead with a fresh raft of measures to spur development, uptake and use of AI, that the committee has opened its inquiry into artificial intelligence, business and the future of the workforce. Over the coming months it will test the attitudes and approaches of big and small business alike, alongside the public sector.

The terms of reference are refreshingly blunt. What real, here-and-now benefits is AI delivering to British business, the health service and local government? Which gains remain stubbornly out of reach, and what is blocking them? Is adoption in some sectors leaning too heavily on a handful of large technology platforms? And what should we make of the curious finding that Britain’s micro-businesses appear to be embracing AI more readily than their small and mid-sized counterparts?

Above all: what do we stand to lose?

The prize is not trivial. The OECD has estimated that AI adoption could add between 0.4 and 1.3 percentage points to UK productivity growth, worth tens of billions in additional output by the end of the decade. Realising even a fraction of that would move the dial on a productivity problem that has dogged the British economy for the best part of two decades.

Yet the evidence already gathering on the desks of the nation’s business press suggests the gains are real but uneven. Smaller firms are reporting quick, low-cost productivity wins, drafting copy, planning staff rotas, trimming waste, handling routine customer queries, long before they tackle anything more ambitious. The tools are cheap and, for the most part, straightforward to deploy. The harder, more valuable transformations remain the preserve of the few.

The committee’s interest in firm size cuts to the heart of the matter. Adoption is not spread evenly across the economy, and the reasons are familiar to anyone who has watched smaller firms wrestle with new technology: thin margins, scarce digital skills, a shortage of time to experiment and a justified wariness of betting the business on an unproven tool. Closing that gap, and unlocking the growth that AI promises UK SMEs, is rapidly becoming the defining test of whether the technology delivers for the whole economy or merely the well-resourced top of it.

Rt Hon Liam Byrne MP, Chair of the committee, framed the challenge in characteristically direct terms. “We can all see the excitement around artificial intelligence, but what is less clear is whether enough British businesses are actually using it to improve productivity, cut costs and win new customers,” he said. “We have heard growing concerns that while some firms are racing ahead, too many others, especially smaller businesses, are struggling to adopt these technologies at scale. If that is true, Britain risks falling behind competitors who are moving faster.”

He was equally alive to the downside. “At the same time, there are obvious questions about reliability, security and trust. Stories of AI systems producing flawed analysis, fabricated references and poor advice underline the importance of getting this right. Our inquiry will examine where AI is genuinely making a difference, what is holding back wider adoption, and what government and industry must do to ensure the benefits are spread across the economy. The challenge now is not just to invent the future, but to make sure Britain is equipped to maximise it.”

That last line bears repeating, because it captures the whole exercise. Invention has never been Britain’s weakness. Diffusion is, getting good ideas out of the laboratory, off the conference stage and onto the shop floors and back offices of the country’s 5.5 million businesses. On that score, the jury is still very much out, and the committee’s inquiry could not be better timed.

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Beyond the hype: what do British businesses really make of AI?

A quarter of British manufacturers have moved some operations overseas or are weighing it up, blaming energy costs that Make UK says have left the sector “uncompetitive” against foreign rivals.

A quarter of Britain’s manufacturers have either shifted part of their production abroad or are actively considering it, as punishing energy costs erode their ability to compete on the world stage.

One in ten firms has already begun outsourcing more of its production overseas, according to a survey by Make UK, the manufacturers’ lobby group, with a further 16 per cent weighing up whether to follow. Most of those heading for the exit are looking to Asia, China and South Korea chief among them, where industrial energy is markedly cheaper.

The findings will sharpen concern that Britain is quietly losing the very industrial base ministers have pledged to rebuild. As Make UK has warned, UK industrial electricity prices sit far above the global average, leaving even efficient, well-run factories struggling to win work against competitors operating on a fraction of the energy bill.

“We’ve got the highest energy costs in the world,” said Stephen Phipson, chief executive of Make UK. “A year ago, the big trend was onshoring and bringing back supply chains to the UK. Now companies can’t use UK suppliers because they’re too expensive, so they’re going overseas. We are seeing quite a flight from UK manufacturing because we’re uncompetitive. We need the government to step in now.”

It is a striking reversal. The drive to bring supply chains home, which gathered pace after the pandemic and a run of geopolitical shocks, has gone into retreat barely a year later, undone, manufacturers say, by the cost of keeping the lights and machines on.

Britain is home to roughly 130,000 manufacturers, together accounting for about 9 per cent of the economy. Make UK estimates the average British manufacturer pays around 27p per kilowatt-hour for electricity, against closer to 16p across other developed nations. In the United States, the figure is about 6p. As Business Matters has previously reported, the gap with key European rivals such as Germany is wide enough to tilt investment decisions away from the UK before a single order is placed.

The government has acknowledged that high energy costs are hurting industry and has promised help. On top of the wholesale price, UK manufacturers pay five separate levies, the largest being the climate change levy.

About 450 energy-intensive manufacturers already receive relief from four of those levies through the British Industry Supercharger. A broader British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme (Bics), which would strip out three of the levies for a further 10,000 businesses, is due to come in next April. Make UK wants the scheme brought forward immediately and extended to every manufacturer.

“We need to do something now; we can’t wait until next year for help,” Phipson said. “At this rate, we’re going to see a rapid decline in the ability to manufacture things in this country. Britain faces deindustrialisation unless manufacturers get relief from high energy prices.”

The warning chimes with a wider deterioration in sentiment across the sector. Business Matters has reported that rising business costs have pushed manufacturers towards an investment tipping point, with projects increasingly at risk of being cancelled or relocated.

Almost half of those surveyed said their energy bills had risen further since the war in Iran, yet stiff competition from foreign rivals has left them unable to pass the extra costs on to customers in full. The squeeze is severe: 98 per cent of respondents expect a “very significant or somewhat significant” hit to profitability, and one in ten believes it could be insolvent within twelve months.

A government spokesman said manufacturing was “vital to the UK’s success and economic growth” and that ministers were alive to the challenges facing the industry. “We will continue to work closely with manufacturing businesses across the UK to ensure we’re doing what we can to help them through tough times,” he added.

For now, though, the message from the factory floor is that warm words are not enough. With the timetable for meaningful relief running into next year and beyond, a growing number of manufacturers appear unwilling to wait, and are voting with their feet.

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One in four UK manufacturers shift production abroad as energy bills bite

Britain risks losing yet more high street shops, and becoming a dumping ground for unsafe imports, unless ministers move faster to close a tax loophole being exploited by overseas sellers, retailers have warned.

Andrew Murphy, chief executive of The Entertainer, the toy chain that trades from more than 150 stores, has voiced “grave concern and profound frustration” at the government’s plan to wait until 2029 before scrapping the £135 “de minimis” customs threshold.

The rule lets overseas sellers, among them the Chinese ecommerce giants Temu and Shein, ship parcels worth less than £135 into the UK without paying customs duties. British retailers importing goods in bulk, by contrast, must pay duties, VAT and compliance costs on every consignment. It is a structural disadvantage that domestic players have been pressing the government to end for months.

In a letter to ministers seen by The Times, Murphy branded the timetable an “unacceptable delay to reform”, arguing that it “extends by years the existence of an uneven playing field with respect to foreign marketplace sellers”. The postponement, he wrote, was “wholly indefensible and deeply damaging to UK retailers in an era already characterised by extreme economic challenge for the sector”.

The intervention lands shortly after Temu was fined €200 million by the European Commission, which found the platform had allowed the sale of illegal and unsafe products, including dangerous baby toys and defective phone chargers. The penalty, the largest yet handed down under the EU’s Digital Services Act, followed regulators’ conclusion that Temu had failed to properly assess the systemic risks its marketplace posed to consumers. The Commission set out its findings in detail, noting that a mystery-shopping exercise found phone chargers failing basic electrical safety standards and baby toys carrying medium-to-high safety risks. Temu has rejected the assessment.

Platforms such as Shein and Temu have expanded rapidly in Britain by selling very cheap products shipped directly from manufacturers. Their rise has drawn complaints from domestic retailers, among them Sainsbury’s, Currys and AO World, who argue the tax treatment hands overseas rivals an unfair advantage. The growing pressure prompted the Chancellor to order a review of the loophole last year.

The government confirmed last year that it would abolish the de minimis exemption, but not until 2029. Ministers say a gradual transition is needed to avoid the border disruption and customs delays seen in the United States after it removed its own exemption for low-value imports.

Murphy pointed out that the US abolished its $800 exemption last August, and that the European Union will introduce a temporary customs duty on low-value parcels from next month ahead of wider reforms. “The UK, by contrast, will not even begin imposing duties until some time in 2029,” he wrote, warning that Britain risked becoming an “ecommerce dumping ground” as sellers diverted goods away from markets where tighter rules were taking hold.

He cited research by the British Toy and Hobby Association (BTHA), which has been buying and testing toys from online marketplaces since 2018. In its latest investigation, 86 per cent of around 90 toys bought from seven marketplaces, including Temu, Shein, Amazon, eBay and TikTok Shop, failed safety tests, with a further 4 per cent breaching UK labelling standards. Murphy said the loophole had become a “route by which unsafe goods can and do enter the UK” and reach the public.

Geoff Sheffield, chairman of the Toy Retailer Association, said non-compliant products were “a major concern for all our members, from the largest multinationals to the smallest independent shops”. Such toys, he added, “not only put children at risk of harm and damage the reputation of the entire industry, but they undercut genuine UK toy retailers”. The government, he said, needed to “accelerate the legislation to prevent more of our members disappearing from the UK high street”.

The warning comes against a grim run for big toy retailers. Toys R Us closed more than 100 shops after collapsing into administration, while Hamleys, Woolworths and Mothercare have all shut stores over the years, part of a longer roll-call of familiar names that have vanished from the high street.

Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the British Retail Consortium, said faster reform was needed to protect more businesses. “Every day the government delays introducing a new customs system for low-value imports is another day that harms British businesses,” she said. “With the US and EU already moving quickly to close this loophole, the UK stands alone, increasing the risk that even more goods could be dumped on our market.”

A Treasury spokesman said: “The rapid growth in low-value imports is hurting our high streets and retailers. We are removing the customs duty relief for low-value imports and reforming the way these goods are declared into the UK to ensure all goods are appropriately controlled.” The reform, he added, “backs our businesses to compete and grow, controls safety and flow of goods at our border, and keeps the UK in line with our international partners”.

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Retailers warn De Minimis delay will turn Britain into a ‘dumping ground’ for unsafe goods

Britain’s night-time economy has rarely been short of warnings about its own mortality. What is new is the willingness of its trade body to name a politician it believes can do something about it.

The Night Time Industries Association (NTIA) has publicly backed Andy Burnham’s call for a cut to VAT across hospitality and the wider night-time economy, arguing that the sector cannot withstand three more years of rising taxation, fragile consumer confidence and what it describes as a failure of political will. It is an unusually pointed intervention from an organisation that is careful to stress it remains apolitical, and it lands at a moment when the campaign to lower hospitality’s tax burden has acquired real momentum.

The association’s central contention is straightforward. Nightclubs, bars, pubs, restaurants, live music venues, festivals, event organisers and cultural institutions are being squeezed simultaneously by VAT, employer National Insurance contributions, business rates and stubbornly high energy costs. The result, the NTIA argues, has been a steady attrition of venues, cancelled events and retreating investment across what it calls one of the country’s most important cultural and employment sectors. The trade body has long called for a VAT cut to halt a string of nightclub closures, and its language has hardened as the closures have continued.

Why Burnham, and why now? The Greater Manchester mayor put himself at the centre of the debate at this year’s Night Time Economy Summit in Liverpool, where, speaking alongside former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, he told an audience of operators and national media that he would “argue for a VAT rate more consistent with what you find in Europe because of the social value that your businesses bring to places and towns.” For an industry that has spent years lobbying with little to show for it, a senior political figure putting VAT explicitly on the table was a moment worth seizing.

Michael Kill, chief executive of the NTIA, framed the endorsement as a matter of survival rather than party allegiance. “We are apolitical as an organisation, but we are not neutral when it comes to the survival of our industry,” he said. “The hospitality and night-time economy sectors are under more pressure than at any point in recent memory. Businesses are being crippled by taxation at a time when margins have been eroded, consumer confidence remains fragile and operating costs continue to rise.”

Kill was blunt about the choice he believes operators now face. “The reality is that our industry cannot survive three more years of the current approach. Businesses are closing, investment is drying up and confidence has collapsed,” he said. “What many operators now see is a stark choice: three more years of economic uncertainty and additional pressure on already struggling businesses, or a change in leadership and direction that finally recognises the value of hospitality, nightlife, festivals, events and culture to the UK economy.”

His sharpest warning concerned the prospect of further tax rises. “What worries us most is that, while businesses are already struggling under unprecedented pressure, there are now discussions about increasing taxes even further. For many operators, there is simply nothing left to give.” Hospitality and nightlife, he argued, should be treated as economic drivers and major employers rather than “a convenient source of revenue.”

The NTIA’s intervention does not exist in a vacuum. The wider trade has coalesced around the #VATsTheProblem campaign, fronted by chef and publican Tom Kerridge and backed by UKHospitality, the British Beer and Pub Association and others, which is pressing for a reduction in hospitality VAT from 20 per cent. The accompanying petition passed 200,000 signatures within days of launching, a measure of how raw the issue has become. Sentiment was hardly improved by the summer’s “Great British Summer Savings” package, which cut VAT to 5 per cent on family attractions but conspicuously snubbed the night-time economy, a slight the NTIA has not forgotten.

The case for relief rests on a simple proposition: that a lower VAT rate would protect jobs, stimulate consumer spending and safeguard the venues, festivals and cultural spaces that anchor town and city centres. The case against — that the Treasury can ill afford to forgo the revenue when the public finances are stretched — is equally familiar, and it is the argument the sector has run up against for the better part of a decade.

For now, the NTIA is betting that one of the few politicians willing to engage on its terms also happens to be among the most plausible future occupants of Downing Street. Burnham is not in government, and three years of this Parliament remain. But in backing him so openly, the association has made a calculated wager that a change of direction is more likely to come from championing an outside contender than from continued, unrewarded loyalty to the status quo. Whether that bet pays off will depend less on the strength of the industry’s case, which is well rehearsed, than on the political arithmetic of the next three years.

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NTIA backs Burnham for No 10 as night-time economy pleads for a VAT lifeline

Selling a business is often viewed as the finishing line. For many SME owners, it represents years of work, risk, reinvestment and personal commitment finally being converted into value.

But the sale process itself can create risks that are easy to underestimate.

Most owners focus heavily on valuation, finding the right buyer and negotiating the headline price. Those are important, but they are only part of the picture. The detail behind the deal can have just as much impact on the final outcome, especially when due diligence, warranties, indemnities, deferred consideration and post-completion claims come into play.

For owners preparing to sell, the question is not only ‘what is my business worth?’ It is also ‘what could come back to affect me after the deal is signed?’

Completion does not always mean the end of risk

A common misconception is that once a sale completes, the seller can simply walk away. In practice, many business sales include ongoing obligations for the seller.

The buyer will usually expect a detailed set of warranties in the Sale and Purchase Agreement. These are statements about the condition of the business, its finances, contracts, employees, assets, liabilities, tax position and other key areas. If a warranty later proves to be inaccurate, the buyer may have grounds to bring a claim.

For SME owners, understanding their personal liability risk after selling a business is an important part of preparing for a cleaner exit. Even where a deal appears straightforward, the wording of the agreement, the accuracy of disclosures and the scope of warranties can all affect the seller’s position after completion.

As John Goodson, Client Director at Macbeths, explains: “Many owners assume the risk ends when the deal completes. In reality, the warranties and statements made during a sale can leave sellers exposed if issues are discovered later. That is why preparation, disclosure and specialist advice matter before terms are agreed.”

This is where owners can be caught out. Even if there is no intention to mislead, a historic issue, missing record or poorly disclosed problem can create friction after completion. The risk is often higher in owner-managed businesses, where key information may sit with a small number of people rather than in a formalised reporting structure.

A buyer does not want surprises after paying for a business. If they discover something that affects the value of what they have bought, they may look for a route to recover that loss.

The risks SME owners often overlook

Every transaction is different, but there are several areas where SME owners often underestimate their exposure.

1. Incomplete or rushed disclosure

Disclosure is one of the seller’s main protections during a business sale. If a known issue is properly disclosed to the buyer before completion, it can reduce the chance of that issue forming the basis of a later warranty claim.

The problem is that disclosure is often rushed. Owners may be balancing the transaction with the day-to-day running of the business, while also dealing with advisers, buyers, employees and confidentiality concerns.

Examples of issues that may need careful disclosure include:

• Customer disputes
• Supplier contract issues
• Late payments or bad debt
• Employment grievances
• Health and safety incidents
• Regulatory concerns
• Pending tax queries
• Lease or property issues
• Data protection breaches
• Software licensing gaps

None of these automatically prevents a sale, but failing to identify and disclose them clearly can create unnecessary risk.

2. Overconfidence in financial records

Many SME owners know their numbers well, but buyer due diligence will often go deeper than management accounts or year-end figures.

Buyers may test revenue quality, customer concentration, recurring income, margins, stock value, debtor recoverability, working capital and normalised profit. They may also look for unusual adjustments, related-party transactions or dependencies on the current owner.

If the buyer finds inconsistencies late in the process, the result may be a reduced valuation, delayed completion, a demand for additional warranties or a larger retention.

Strong financial preparation is not just about presenting the business well. It is about reducing the chance of the deal being renegotiated when momentum should be building.

3. Contract and customer risks

For many SMEs, value is tied closely to customer relationships and key contracts. That creates risk if those contracts are informal, poorly documented or dependent on the current owner.

Owners should pay particular attention to:

• Change-of-control clauses
• Termination rights
• Exclusivity provisions
• Personal guarantees
• Long-term pricing commitments
• Verbal or informal agreements
• Contracts due for renewal shortly after completion

A buyer may be concerned if significant revenue could disappear after the sale. Even where there is no immediate problem, unclear contract terms can weaken the seller’s position during negotiation.

4. Employment and people issues

People risks are often underestimated, especially in smaller businesses where HR processes may have developed informally over time.

Potential issues include unclear employment contracts, undocumented bonus arrangements, unresolved grievances, restrictive covenant concerns, holiday pay issues, contractor status questions and key-person dependency.

A buyer will want to understand whether the business can continue to operate effectively after the owner exits. If knowledge, client relationships or operational control sit too heavily with one person, the buyer may seek additional protections or reduce the price.

For this reason, succession planning and management structure can be just as important as financial performance.

5. Tax, VAT and historic liabilities

Tax and VAT issues can be particularly sensitive because they may relate to periods before the buyer owned the business. Buyers will often seek warranties or indemnities to protect themselves from historic liabilities.

This does not mean every business needs to have a perfect tax history before going to market. But it does mean sellers should understand any areas of uncertainty and take appropriate tax advice before they become buyer concerns.

Waiting until due diligence is underway can leave the seller with less control over the narrative.

6. Data, cyber and systems risk

Cyber and data protection risks are now part of mainstream transaction due diligence. Buyers may want to know how customer data is held, whether systems are secure, whether there have been historic breaches and whether software licences are valid and transferable.

For SMEs, this can be a weak spot. Systems may have been built gradually over many years, with old platforms, shared logins, informal processes or unclear ownership of digital assets.

A buyer does not just want the trading business. They want confidence that the infrastructure supporting it is stable, compliant and transferable.

7. Deferred consideration and earn-outs

Not every sale is paid entirely on completion. Some deals include deferred consideration, earn-outs or performance-based payments. These structures can help bridge a valuation gap, but they also create risk for the seller.

If future payments depend on performance after completion, the seller needs to understand how that performance will be measured and who controls the factors that influence it.

Common points of dispute include:

• Revenue recognition
• Cost allocation
• Management control
• Customer retention
• Integration decisions
• Accounting treatment
• Targets that are not clearly defined

A headline price can look attractive, but the certainty of payment matters just as much.

How owners can reduce risk before going to market

The strongest position is usually built before the business is formally marketed. Once a buyer is engaged and due diligence has started, the seller has less time and less control.

Owners considering a sale should take practical steps early.

Get the business sale-ready

This means organising financial records, contracts, policies, employee documentation, supplier agreements, leases, licences and corporate records before they are requested.

A clean data room can give buyers confidence and reduce delays. It also helps advisers identify issues before they become deal obstacles.

Review the likely warranties in advance

Owners should not wait until late in the process to think about warranties. Reviewing the likely warranty areas early can help identify where information is missing, where disclosures may be needed and where advice should be taken.

This can also prevent sellers from agreeing to statements they cannot properly verify.

Resolve obvious issues where possible

Some issues cannot be fixed before sale, but many can be improved.

For example, expired contracts can be renewed, informal employee arrangements can be documented, customer disputes can be resolved, software licences can be checked and governance records can be updated.

These actions may seem administrative, but they can support buyer confidence and reduce negotiation pressure.

Take advice early

A business sale is not the time to rely on assumptions. Legal, tax, accounting and corporate finance advice should be brought in early enough to shape the transaction, not just react to it.

For some transactions, insurance advice is also worth including in the conversation before terms are finalised. Alongside legal, tax and financial input, specialist mergers and acquisitions insurancecan help address certain risks connected to warranties, indemnities and post-completion claims. The suitability of this type of cover will depend on the structure of the deal, the size of the transaction and the specific risks being transferred, and any cover will be subject to policy terms, conditions and exclusions.

The important point is timing. Insurance should not be treated as a last-minute consideration once the deal is already advanced. If it may be relevant, it is better to explore it early.

The value of a cleaner sale process

A well-prepared sale process does not only reduce risk. It can also protect value.

Buyers are more likely to challenge price or seek additional protections when they find uncertainty. By contrast, a seller who can provide clear records, sensible disclosures and a well-organised due diligence process is usually in a stronger negotiating position.

This does not mean hiding weaknesses. It means understanding them, addressing them where possible and disclosing them properly where needed.

For SME owners, this can make the difference between a sale that proceeds smoothly and one that becomes slower, more expensive and more stressful than expected.

A final checklist for SME owners preparing to sell

Before going to market, owners should ask themselves:

• Are our financial records complete, consistent and easy to explain?
• Are key customer and supplier contracts properly documented?
• Do any contracts include change-of-control clauses?
• Are employee contracts, policies and records up to date?
• Are there any unresolved disputes, claims or complaints?
• Have we reviewed tax, VAT and historic liabilities?
• Are software, data and cyber risks properly understood?
• Could the buyer ask for deferred consideration, retention or escrow?
• Are we clear on what warranties we may be asked to give?
• Have we taken advice on how to reduce post-completion exposure?

Selling a business is one of the most important commercial decisions an owner can make. The most successful exits are rarely built at the negotiation table alone. They are built through preparation, clear records, early advice and a realistic understanding of where risk may sit after completion.

For owners thinking about a sale, the best time to address these issues is before the buyer starts asking difficult questions.

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Selling Your Business? The Risks SME Owners Often Overlook Before Completion

Family pictures are evergreen with memories of both the young and the old. From big moments to special events, they showcase relations. And on some occasions, you can reopen the catalogue to revisit the happenings. Going through these photos is more relatable when the visuals are bold and clear, as if they were recent.

Gone are the days when images could only be viewed at their default quality, whether soft or hard copies. Media files storage and editing have evolved. The evolution extends to the restoration of old pictures for modern usage. Even if they have aged several years before reviewing.

With AI technology, you can restore details of family photos with more clarity. Zawa is one of these game-changers, with an image enhancer tool that suits the purpose.

The Zawa Image Enhancer

The Image Enhancer is one of the editing tools on the Zawa workspace. As the name suggests, the enhancer upscale image quality. It is powered by AI technology that fixes low-resolution appearance and traditional editing. Whether a single or multiple images, the image enhancer auto-processes photo uploads for high-resolution results.

Zawa brings old photos to life with a comprehensive brush. For damaged images, the AI easily restores details and fixes blur. As a user, you can make customisations and select your preferred new image resolution, such as HD or Ultra HD. The AI sharpens and enhances images for professional-quality results – up to 4K resolution.

Can I Restore Old Photos for Free?

Yes, you can restore the quality of old photos at no cost. You do not need to hire a designer or scroll through the web endlessly for paid tools to fix the basics. Various apps and online software support free image restoration features. Some offer a few trial periods to test the tool. And enhance old photos to modern resolutions.

Zawa allows users to upscale and restore old photos for free, even without signing up. With the free trial, you can restore up to 20 images daily at a time. In addition, the image enhancer tool allows export to devices in HD quality. If you intend to access advanced Zawa features, the premium mode offers more.

How Can I Restore Old or Damaged Family Photos with Zawa?

Restoring old or damaged family photos with Zawa does not require going back and forth. You can perform the process in a few minutes. With these steps below, you can easily restore images to a more standard quality.

Open the Zawa Webpage

Open the Zawa AI website to upload the old or damaged family photo from your device. The user interface is intuitive and easy to understand for first-time users. It is a layout without ads that could distort viewing experiences.

Upload the Photo(s)

If you want to restore an old family photo as a hard copy, you need a camera to capture it and save it on your device. The online image enhancer does not support direct camera access. You can only upload saved images in your folder. Even better, Zawa supports batch upload; you can refine a collage of images at once, saving users more time.

Select Image Mode

For accurate editing and precise restoration, Zawa AI outlines scenes for different types of images that users upload that they want to fix. It is not a one-scene-all fix technology, unlike other software.

From product to portrait mode, the editing process is customizable. It comes with a range of enhancements – HD or UHD – before starting the restoration. In addition to these modes, you can edit the background of damaged family photos or erase unwanted elements.

Enhance the Photo(s)

After selecting the scenario to be processed, click on the image enhancer on the screen to restore the affected images. Depending on the photo size, the image processing takes only a few seconds to provide results. However, the AI overall restoration time does not keep users waiting.

Review the Result

Once processing is complete, the AI produces image results separated by a vertical pane. This showcases the “before and after” results. And you can swipe the pane left or right to evaluate the damaged and restored copies. Reviewing the pictures before downloading allows you to make your choices or re-enhance the images.

Zawa AI Features for Old Family Pictures

Scenario-Based Optimisation

Zawa AI comes with various modes for scenario-based optimisation. The AI optimises these scenes based on the category of your image upload. For instance, a damaged family portrait picture and faded texts in an old picture. It handles scenarios to transform your uploads into a more visible output.

The text mode makes the text in images sharper and easier to read after upscaling. Enhancing images in the portrait mode provides more detail and a natural feel. The AI technology fixes the scenes for more precision after edits.

Ultra HD Editing

The perks of image restoration are results that align with current-day resolution; Zawa delivers just that. The image enhancer does not only upscale images. You can brighten family images with the online enhancer. The AI sharpens every image detail for professional-quality results.

With the 4K image enhancer, Zawa erases blurs and distortions that mar your image. The high-resolution output makes them more refined for re-sharing on social media. And collated as a collage of pictures.

Bulk Uploads

Restoring a collection of old family photos one by one can be tiring. It is a typical back-and-forth that you can grow tired of midway. Zawa AI makes the process effortless with bulk uploads. You can enhance up to 20 family photos at once with the free Image Enhancer. And get the result instantly.

Zawa incorporates a smart AI technology and editor for handling bulk images. In addition to saving time, the AI sharpens every visual and refines every detail just like it processes an image. Get your family images done at once and print the memories.

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How to Restore Old and Damaged Family Photos with Zawa Image Enhancer

Not every repair economy is built around expensive parts or major refurbishments. Much of it depends on small components that keep everyday products usable for longer.

A worn gasket, a damaged hinge, or a leaking shower door seal hardly sounds like the foundation of a long-term business.Yet these small components support steady demand in the repair and replacement-parts market.

The market for the replacement shower door seal provides one small example of how everyday components can support specialist businesses built around recurring maintenance problems.

Small Components Create Ongoing Demand

In a typical UK home, the bathroom contains many components that wear out long before the main fixture reaches the end of its life.

Most replacement parts are not impulse purchases. People buy them because something they already own is no longer working properly. That means demand is usually practical, specific and often urgent.

When a shower door starts leaking, tenants want a quick solution before water damages flooring or creates a dispute over responsibility. Homeowners would rather replace a small component than replace an entire shower enclosure because of a gap around the door. Property managers often want to solve a maintenance issue quickly without having to investigate larger structural or plumbing problems.

These products exist because the underlying problem keeps appearing in homes, rentals and commercial properties.

The Hard Part Is Knowing Which Replacement Fits

The challenge for customers in the replacement-parts market is often not finding a product. It is knowing which one to buy.

Many replacement parts look almost identical in online photos, yet perform very differently once installed. Small differences can determine whether a replacement actually solves the issue.

In niche markets, large retailers may stock thousands of products, but customers are often left to work out the differences themselves. Specialist suppliers can provide a clearer map of products, making the selection process far easier.

That clarity often comes down to how well the products are explained: clear categories, accurate measurements, useful installation guidance, comparison images, and help for customers who do not know the name of the profile they are trying to replace.

Even a product category that appears simple can be surprisingly complex. A shower door bottom seal, for example, is far from a standard plastic strip.

Differences may include:

• Glass thickness
• Gap size
• Profile design
• Deflector or wiping fin configuration
• Suitability for framed or frameless doors

Many customers do not want to dig through technical product details. They take photos of the old seal, hoping to match the same profile. But with so many similar-looking products online, the subtle differences can be hard to spot. If the shower door is older, the original seal may also be outdated and difficult to identify.

Specialist suppliers with real product depth can meet this demand. For example, showerdoorseal.uk, operated by Simba International Limited, is a UK-focused shower door seal supplier that helps customers narrow down suitable replacements from photos of the door or old seal, including older, discontinued, and hard-to-identify profiles.

That kind of support makes a large product range easier to navigate, especially for customers who only know what the old seal looks like, not what it is called.

Quality Is Hidden in the Details

Many replacement parts look much simpler than they actually are. A shower door seal may appear to be nothing more than a piece of plastic, yet it has to grip the glass, move with the door, contain water and maintain its shape through years of daily use.

As a result, product quality is often determined by details that customers never notice at first glance.

Material formulation affects flexibility and durability. Profile wall thickness affects long-term stability. Profile design affects how effectively water is directed back into the enclosure.

The connection between softer and harder materials also plays an important role. Over time, repeated bending and movement place stress on this area. If the soft wiping section begins to separate from the harder gripping section, the seal may still appear intact while no longer performing as intended.

That is why replacement parts should not automatically be viewed as low-value consumables.

Poor-quality components can allow the same problem to return, while better-designed products are more likely to maintain their performance over time. Specialist manufacturers that focus on the same category for years often understand these weak points well and design products to address them.

The Real Cost Is the Second Repair

A replacement part may be inexpensive. Getting it wrong often is not.

A seal that almost fits can still leak. A hinge that is slightly off-specification can prevent a door from closing correctly. A gasket with the wrong profile can allow the original problem to return. The result is another order, another wait and another attempt to complete the repair.

For a specialist supplier, reducing that cycle is part of the service. Customers are not only paying for the product itself. They are also paying for fewer mistakes, fewer delays and a better chance of solving the problem the first time.

Small Parts, Real Value

A leaking shower door seal is rarely a dramatic problem. It is just one of those small household faults that needs sorting before it becomes more annoying or more expensive.

That is why narrow repair categories keep creating room for specialist suppliers. People are not always looking for the cheapest strip of plastic. They are trying to avoid buying the wrong one, waiting twice, or discovering after installation that the leak is still there.

In that kind of market, the useful business is often the one that knows the category well enough to remove the guesswork. The part may be small, but getting it right is what makes the repair feel simple.

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What Shower Door Seals Reveal About the Repair Economy 

Irina Ciochiu is a Romanian entrepreneur and legal professional best known as the Founder and CEO of FlightHelp, a company focused on passenger rights and flight compensation across Europe.

With a legal background from the University of Craiova, she has built her career at the intersection of aviation, regulation, and consumer advocacy.

Ciochiu entered the passenger rights industry after recognising a major gap between legal protections and the average traveller’s ability to use them. While regulations such as EU261 provide strong protections for passengers affected by delays, cancellations, and overbookings, many people still struggle to understand the claims process or challenge airline decisions effectively.

Through FlightHelp, she has worked to simplify that process by creating systems that help passengers navigate complex airline regulations and compensation procedures. Her work focuses on combining legal understanding with operational efficiency, particularly in cases where airlines cite extraordinary circumstances or provide limited information about the real cause of disruptions.

Over the years, Ciochiu has expanded her work across several European markets, including Romania, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, and Germany. She is recognised for her practical, results-driven approach and her focus on turning complex legal frameworks into accessible solutions for everyday travellers.

Today, Irina Ciochiu continues to advocate for greater transparency, accountability, and passenger awareness within the European aviation industry.

Q&A with Irina Ciochiu

Q: What first led you towards the aviation and passenger rights industry?

Irina Ciochiu:
My background is in law, and during my studies at the University of Craiova I became very interested in how regulations work in practice. I noticed that many industries had strong legal protections on paper, but ordinary people often struggled to use them effectively. Aviation stood out because passengers were frequently left confused after delays or cancellations, even when regulations like EU261 existed to protect them.

That gap between the law and the real-world experience is what pushed me towards this industry.

Q: Was there a specific moment when you realised this could become a business opportunity?

Irina Ciochiu:
Yes. I realised that most passengers simply did not know what they were entitled to or how to challenge airline decisions. Many accepted a rejection immediately, especially when airlines mentioned extraordinary circumstances.

At the same time, airlines rarely provide the actual operational reason for a disruption in writing. That creates a situation where passengers are trying to navigate a highly technical process without access to the necessary information.

I saw an opportunity to build systems that could simplify that process and provide proper support.

Q: What were the early challenges of building FlightHelp?

Irina Ciochiu:
The aviation industry is extremely complex. You are dealing with multiple countries, different regulations, airline procedures, and operational issues all at once.

One of the biggest challenges was navigating regulatory complexity across multiple jurisdictions while still building something scalable. Early operational problems actually helped improve our systems because they forced us to refine processes very quickly.

Those experiences made the business much more resilient over time.

Q: What do you think passengers misunderstand most about EU261?

Irina Ciochiu:
A lot of passengers believe that if an airline rejects a claim, that is the end of the process. That is often not true.

Even when airlines cite extraordinary circumstances, passengers may still qualify for compensation depending on the actual details behind the disruption. The problem is that most travellers do not have access to that information or know how to assess it properly.

That is why professional support can be very important during the claims process.

Q: How does FlightHelp approach these situations differently?

Irina Ciochiu:
We focus on simplifying the process for passengers. Most people do not want to spend hours studying regulations or dealing with complicated airline communication.

Our role is to help bridge that gap. We combine legal understanding with operational systems designed to review claims properly and guide passengers through the process.

The goal is not just filing claims. It is helping people understand their rights and their options.

Q: Your work spans several European markets. Has that shaped your perspective on the industry?

Irina Ciochiu:
Definitely. Working across countries like Romania, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, and Germany shows you how different passenger experiences can be, even under the same regulations.

It also highlights how important consistency and transparency are. Travellers should not need legal expertise just to understand whether they may qualify for compensation after a disrupted flight.

The more accessible these systems become, the better the experience is for passengers overall.

Q: What is your leadership style like?

Irina Ciochiu:
I am very structured and focused on execution. I like breaking large problems into smaller, measurable steps.

I also believe strongly in iteration. Every challenge, good result, or failure gives feedback that helps improve the system.

In industries like aviation, where things constantly change, adaptability is extremely important.

Q: What keeps you motivated in this industry?

Irina Ciochiu:
I think it comes back to solving real-world problems. Passenger rights are important, but they only matter if people can actually access them.

That is what motivates me. Building systems that make complicated processes easier for ordinary travellers and helping people feel less powerless during stressful situations.

Q: What do you think the future of passenger rights looks like in Europe?

Irina Ciochiu:
I think awareness will continue to grow. More passengers are starting to understand that they have rights and that airline decisions are not always final.

At the same time, the aviation industry will continue evolving, which means regulations and operational processes will also change. Transparency and accountability will become even more important.

My focus is continuing to improve systems that help passengers navigate that environment more effectively.

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Irina Ciochiu on Passenger Rights, Aviation, and Building FlightHelp

Few realise that the most noticeable change in leisure spending lately has little to do with new shows or games and everything to do with the quiet mechanics of moving money from one account to another.

Payment innovations now sit at the heart of how consumers access digital entertainment, and startups in this space are drawing steady attention from business observers. The same tools that let someone settle a restaurant bill in seconds also support smoother transactions inside an online casino, turning what used to feel like a slow process into something almost invisible.

Early Experiments That Set the Pattern

Startups began testing real-time payment rails several years ago, often focusing first on small-ticket leisure purchases. These early trials showed that speed alone could lift completion rates by noticeable margins. Entrepreneurs noticed that when checkout took under ten seconds, repeat engagement rose without any extra marketing spend. Traditional banks watched from the sidelines at first, but the pattern soon spread beyond niche services into mainstream consumer habits. Over time, developers refined the underlying rails by studying user behaviour across different regions, learning that even minor delays could cause people to abandon a booking or in-app purchase. Leisure services that adopted these faster options reported higher average session lengths, as customers spent less time staring at loading screens and more time enjoying the content itself. This shift also encouraged smaller operators to experiment with new pricing tiers, such as pay-per-minute streaming or instant top-ups for virtual goods.

Why Fintech Moves Matter for Broader Markets

Established financial institutions have had to respond as newer entrants introduced lower-friction options for everyday spending. A recent analysis of payment apps highlights how these newcomers challenged older systems by removing several layers of verification that once slowed things down. The result is not only faster transfers but also fresh business models built around recurring micro-payments rather than larger one-off charges. UK small-business owners in the leisure sector now factor these options into their own cash-flow planning, recognising that customer expectations have shifted permanently. Many now compare how fintech threatens banking when deciding which rails to support. Larger chains have begun integrating multiple services side by side, allowing users to choose their preferred method at checkout and thereby reducing cart abandonment across both mobile and desktop experiences. Observers note that this competitive pressure has also prompted traditional banks to accelerate their own digital upgrades, including improved APIs that make it easier for leisure apps to connect directly to customer accounts.

Security Features That Travel with the Transaction

Security upgrades have kept pace with speed gains. Tokenisation and device-bound authentication now travel with each payment, reducing the visibility of sensitive data while still allowing instant confirmation. This matters especially for leisure services that see high volumes of smaller transactions. Developers building these tools often come from backgrounds in both cybersecurity and consumer apps, bringing a hybrid mindset that treats trust as a product feature rather than an afterthought. Regular audits and real-time fraud monitoring have become standard practice, helping services spot unusual patterns before they affect users. Leisure operators appreciate that these measures rarely interrupt the flow for legitimate customers, yet they still provide strong protection against common threats such as stolen credentials or account takeover attempts.

Inclusion Questions Surface in New Research

Payment methods that once required established credit histories are giving way to alternatives that work from simpler starting points. Payment aspects of financial inclusion in the fintech era recent BIS analysis explores how lighter verification routes can open access without compromising oversight. For leisure operators, this expands the reachable audience while also prompting new questions about how to design experiences that feel welcoming across different financial profiles. Research teams have started tracking how users from varied income brackets interact with these new tools, revealing that many appreciate the option to pay in smaller increments rather than committing to large upfront sums. This flexibility can turn occasional visitors into regular participants, especially when combined with clear explanations of fees and limits.

Looking Ahead at Startup Activity

Investment continues to flow toward companies that specialise in seamless cross-border movement of small sums, often with an eye on entertainment verticals. These firms tend to operate with lean teams and focus on modular technology that larger leisure groups can plug into existing systems. The pattern suggests that payment infrastructure itself is becoming a distinct competitive layer, separate from the content or experience it supports. Business decision-makers tracking this space note that partnerships between payment startups and leisure operators are forming earlier in the product cycle than they did even a few years ago. Some of the most promising projects involve shared ledgers that let users move value between different services without repeated currency conversions. Early data from pilot programmes shows reduced costs for both companies and customers, which in turn supports more frequent engagement with digital leisure services. As these technologies mature, analysts expect further consolidation among smaller players while the biggest leisure brands continue to maintain relationships with several services at once.

Practical Takeaways for Decision Makers

Owners of smaller leisure ventures increasingly treat payment choice as part of the overall customer journey rather than a back-office detail. Testing multiple rails, monitoring drop-off points, and adjusting for regional preferences all feature in routine reviews. The underlying technology keeps evolving, yet the core principle remains consistent: the less friction a transaction carries, the more likely it is to complete and repeat. This steady refinement continues to shape how people move through their chosen forms of digital downtime. Forward-thinking operators also schedule regular staff training so teams understand the latest options and can guide customers smoothly when questions arise.

Read more
How Payment Shifts Are Quietly Changing Everyday Leisure

There’s a moment in every B2B sale where the energy shifts. The conversations have gone well, the decision-maker is ready, and both sides want to move forward. Then someone has to produce a contract.

For a surprising number of growing UK businesses, this is where deals slow down. The proposal gets drafted in a Word document, emailed back and forth for revisions, printed for signatures, scanned, and filed somewhere that nobody will find easily. A process that should take hours takes days. In some cases, it takes weeks — long enough for the buyer’s priorities to change, a competitor to reappear, or the internal champion who drove the purchase to get pulled onto something else.

The cost of that friction is real, but it’s also invisible in most sales reporting. Closed-lost deals get recorded. Deals that stalled at the contract stage and eventually closed late don’t usually trigger a postmortem. The time lost between verbal agreement and signature just gets absorbed as the normal cost of doing business.

It doesn’t have to be.

Where the Sales Process Actually Breaks Down

Most UK SMEs and scaling businesses have invested in their sales process up to a point. CRM adoption has grown significantly over the last decade — HubSpot, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 are all common among companies with dedicated sales functions. Pipeline management, lead scoring, deal stages, activity tracking: these are reasonably well-handled in most businesses that have put real effort into sales operations.

The gap tends to appear at the end of the pipeline. A deal reaches “verbal agreement” or “proposal sent” in the CRM, and then the contract process happens somewhere else entirely — usually in email, sometimes in a shared drive, occasionally on paper. The CRM doesn’t know when the contract was sent, whether the buyer opened it, what changes were requested, or when it was signed. That data lives in an inbox or a folder, disconnected from the sales record that everyone else is working from.

The result is a split in visibility right at the moment when deals need the most attention. A sales manager can see that a deal is in the final stage but has no line of sight into whether the contract conversation is moving or stalled. A sales rep has to manually update the CRM after every exchange with the buyer. Finance doesn’t know a deal has closed until someone tells them.

What Joined-Up Contract Management Looks Like

The alternative is treating contract management as part of the sales workflow rather than a separate administrative step that happens after the sale.

In practice, this means contracts are created, sent, negotiated, and signed inside the same system that manages the rest of the deal — or at minimum, deeply connected to it. When a deal reaches the right stage in a CRM, a contract can be generated from a template with the relevant data already populated: company name, contact details, agreed pricing, product or service scope. The rep doesn’t re-enter information that’s already in the system. The contract goes out faster and with fewer errors.

On the buyer’s side, the experience is cleaner too. Instead of receiving a PDF that requires printing or a separate e-signature account, buyers can review, comment, and sign within the same document — on any device. Changes can be proposed and accepted without creating new versions of the file. The entire negotiation history is visible in one place.

When the contract is signed, the CRM updates automatically. The deal closes in the system at the same moment it closes in reality. Finance sees it. The account management team sees it. Nobody has to chase anyone for confirmation that a deal is done.

Why CRM Integration Is the Practical Piece

For this to work inside a real sales operation, the contract tool has to sit inside the tools teams already use — not alongside them.

The integrations available with platforms like HubSpot, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 are what make this practical rather than theoretical. With HubSpot, contracts can be created directly from a Contact, Company, or Deal record. Product line items and participant details pull through automatically. Any changes made to data fields in the contract update the corresponding HubSpot record in real time, which means the CRM stays accurate without manual input from the rep.

The Salesforce integration works the same way — contracts are generated and managed without leaving the CRM, and data flows both ways so that Salesforce remains the single source of truth for account information throughout the contract process. For businesses running Microsoft Dynamics 365, the same logic applies: contract status, engagement tracking, and deal data all feed back into Dynamics so that managers can see exactly where every deal stands from within the system they already use for pipeline oversight.

This matters because the value of a CRM depends on the quality and completeness of its data. A tool that requires reps to manually update records after every contract interaction will produce gaps, especially under pressure. Automating that data flow removes the reliance on human consistency at the most time-pressured stage of the deal.

The Compounding Effect on Revenue

The business case for tightening this part of the sales process isn’t complicated. Deals that move faster through the contract stage close at higher rates — not because the contract software changes anyone’s mind, but because time is the enemy of deals that are already won in principle. Buyers who have mentally committed to a purchase can be unsettled by delays that make the vendor look disorganised. Procurement timelines have windows. Budget cycles have deadlines. A contract process that adds unnecessary days or weeks to a deal introduces risk that doesn’t need to exist.

For UK businesses growing through sales-led motions — adding headcount, entering new verticals, expanding into enterprise accounts — the contract stage is also a brand signal. The experience a buyer has getting a contract signed is part of their impression of how it will feel to work with the company. A smooth, professional process that respects the buyer’s time sets a different expectation than a chain of email attachments and manual reminders.

Scaling businesses often discover the limitations of their contract process not gradually but suddenly — when deal volume increases faster than the manual process can absorb it. Getting ahead of that before it becomes a constraint is easier than trying to fix it while managing a backlog of stalled agreements.

The handshake matters. So does everything that comes after it.

Read more
From Handshake to Signed Deal: Streamlining the Sales Process for Growing UK Businesses

The founders I speak to are tired. Not in a “long week” way. Tired in a way that doesn’t fix itself with a Friday off or a weekend in the Cotswolds. The phone follows them everywhere. Slack notifications onto the train. An investor email they “just need to glance at” before bed.

If you’re reading this, you probably know what I mean.

I want to talk about something that has worked for me, and a handful of founders I’ve sent the same way — a real, deliberate, off-grid founder retreat in a place that physically refuses to let you stay reachable. I’ll be honest about what it costs, where it falls down, and the parts most articles miss.

Why a spa weekend doesn’t actually work

The spa weekend is the polite version of the problem. You arrive. You meditate badly. The food is good. You check your email at 7am and 11pm because the signal is still there, and so are you.

The Harvard Business Review has been writing about executive burnout for years now, and one of the threads researchers keep returning to is that recovery requires psychological detachment — not just physical absence from work. You need an environment where the temptation is genuinely removed, not just frowned upon. Most UK spa breaks fail that test.

I tried the local route first. A long weekend in Wales. Phone in a drawer. Within forty-eight hours I’d opened it three times “just to check the weather.” The reset didn’t take.

What being properly off-grid does to your brain

The first time I genuinely lost signal was inside Masai Mara National Park in Kenya. Not by choice, exactly. The lodge had Wi-Fi at reception and that was the entire offering. You walked there. You sat down and queued.

By day three I’d stopped going to reception.

There’s a particular thing that happens when your phone stops being an option. Your brain stops the background calculation of what if someone needs me. The cortisol drops in a way it can’t drop when you’re 200 yards from a Wi-Fi router. You start sleeping properly, which is a thing most founders haven’t done in years.

The lodge I stayed at was arranged through an operator I’d researched in advance. The time saved here matters more than people realise. Look at established East African travel specialists who handle the planning end-to-end rather than trying to stitch flights, transfers, and park permits together yourself when you’re already running on fumes.

The part I wasn’t expecting

Here’s something I haven’t seen written about properly in the corporate-retreat articles.

It wasn’t the wildlife that did the work. The lions were extraordinary, the migration crossings were genuinely a sight you don’t forget — wildebeest in their hundreds piling into a brown river while the air smelled of dust and wet hide. But that’s not what reset me.

It was the silence at 4:30pm when the wind dropped, the grass stopped moving, and you could actually hear your own breathing. There is no equivalent in a London co-working space. There is no equivalent in a Cornwall holiday cottage. The sound of nothing, in a landscape that extends past the horizon in every direction, does something a meditation app can’t fake.

A friend who runs a fintech in Manchester told me the same thing, in different words, after she went the following year. “I didn’t realise how loud my life was until it stopped.”

The honest cost picture for 2026

Park fees were updated in 2026 and the payment systems are now mostly digital. Kenya Wildlife Service parks are paid through kwspay.ecitizen.go.ke before you arrive. Masai Mara uses a separate Narok County system, which catches almost everyone out the first time.

Where the entry rates sit right now for international visitors:

• Masai Mara: $100 per adult per day from January through June, $200 per adult from July through December.
• Nairobi National Park: $80 per adult per day. There is also a combined “Nairobi Package” pairing the Park with the Safari Walk and Animal Orphanage for $105 per adult — useful if you’ve a stopover day before flying onward.

A practical detail nobody mentions until you’re at the gate: Mara tickets are valid for 12 hours, not 24. KWS tickets are 24. Enter the Mara at 4pm thinking you’ve covered tomorrow morning’s drive, and you haven’t.

Entry fees are only part of the cost. A serious off-grid retreat — flights, transfers, a good lodge, a private vehicle — typically runs $4,000 to $8,000 per person for five to seven nights. There are cheaper versions and considerably more expensive ones. For a realistic sense of what a full itinerary looks like and how seasonal pricing affects the budget, it’s worth reviewing typical Mara-region trip itineraries and recommended travel windows before you brief your assistant on the booking.

Concerns founders raise

“I can’t be unreachable for a week.” This is the most common one, and it deserves a bit of pushback. If your business genuinely can’t function without you for seven days, that itself is the burnout signal — the company is too dependent on a single nervous system. Most founders who go discover the team copes. The ones who plan it well brief two deputies and set an emergency contact protocol before they leave.

“What if something goes wrong out there?” A reasonable question. Malaria is a real risk in the Mara, and a travel-medicine appointment in the UK before you fly isn’t optional. Most reputable operators have evacuation insurance built into the package, but I’d verify it rather than assume.

“Will I actually disconnect, or will I just stew on work for a week?” Honestly, the first couple of days are awkward. The mental chatter doesn’t stop because the signal does. By day three or four most people I know describe something shifting. If it doesn’t, you’ve learned something important about how much your work has colonised your inner life — and that’s information worth having.

Where I got the planning wrong

My first attempt at this, I packed it too tight. I had built an itinerary with three lodges in seven days, an internal flight transfer in the middle, and a pre-dawn balloon ride on day four. By day five I was more tired than when I’d arrived. Moving accommodation is exhausting in the Mara because the roads are rough and the days start before dawn.

The version that worked, two years later, was simpler. One lodge. Six nights. No internal flights. A guide called Patrick — a licensed safari guide with a decade in the job — suggested we skip the dawn drive on day three and have a slow morning instead. That single piece of advice did more for me than the rest of the itinerary combined.

The trade-off is real, though. You see less wildlife when you slow down. If your goal is photography or a comprehensive Big Five tick-list, the slow version isn’t for you. If your goal is to feel like yourself again, it is.

When this isn’t the right answer

Worth saying — this won’t fix a burnout that’s been building for five years. It won’t fix a co-founder relationship that’s broken. It won’t replace therapy if you actually need therapy. BMMagazine has covered why rested founders build better businesses more thoroughly than I can here, and it’s worth reading alongside this piece.

What an off-grid week can do is interrupt the pattern long enough for you to see clearly what needs changing when you come home. That’s the pitch. It’s a smaller claim than the wellness industry usually makes, and it happens to be true.

If you’re considering one, the practical advice is unromantic. Book early. Peak season (July through October) sells out at the better lodges twelve to fourteen months ahead. Brief your team months out, and build buffer days at both ends so you’re not stepping off a long-haul flight straight into a board meeting.

The rest of it — the actual reset — that part the wilderness does for you. You just have to get yourself there.

Read more
How an Off-Grid Founder Retreat Actually Resets Your Thinking (and What It Costs)

Dianoush “Dion” Emami is the Chief Executive Officer of Parkia, Inc., an engineering and construction company specialising in high-voltage transmission and underground electrical infrastructure.

With more than 40 years of experience in the utility energy sector, he has built a career leading complex projects across nuclear power, public utilities, and large-scale transmission systems throughout the western United States.

Born in Iran, Emami left at age 13 during a period of political uncertainty and later continued his education in England before moving to the United States. He graduated from the University of Southern California in 1981 with a degree in Electrical Engineering and began his career at Bechtel Power Corporation, where he worked on major nuclear power facilities, including the Arizona Nuclear Power Plant and the San Onofre Generating Station.

He later joined the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, where he developed technical specifications, evaluated bids, and supported underground electrical distribution projects. In 1997, he moved into executive leadership at Henkels & McCoy, overseeing operations and business development for more than 35 utility clients across the western region.

Since becoming CEO of Parkia in 2014, Emami has led major 69kV to 230kV transmission projects for utilities including LADWP, Southern California Edison, PG&E, SDG&E, and APS. He is recognised for his disciplined leadership style, focus on safety, and commitment to building strong teams and long-term infrastructure systems.

Q: Your career began in nuclear power engineering. What drew you into that field?

I studied Electrical Engineering at the University of Southern California and graduated in 1981. At the time, power generation was one of the most demanding technical fields you could enter, and I was drawn to the responsibility that came with it. I joined Bechtel Power Corporation and worked on projects including the Arizona Nuclear Power Plant and the San Onofre Generating Station.

Nuclear power teaches discipline very quickly. The systems are complex, the regulations are strict, and there is no room for careless decisions. That environment shaped the way I think about engineering and leadership to this day.

Q: What lessons did you take from those early years?

The biggest lesson was accountability. In nuclear power, every technical decision must be defensible. You learn to think carefully, document thoroughly, and focus on safety above everything else.

I often say that success is building things that last while staying accountable to your values. That mindset came directly from those early experiences.

Q: How did your role evolve when you joined the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power?

Moving to LADWP expanded my perspective. I was no longer focused only on engineering design. I became involved in technical specifications, contract evaluations, bid reviews, and underground distribution projects.

That role showed me that infrastructure is not only an engineering challenge. It is also about public responsibility, budgets, long-term planning, and trust. The systems utilities build must perform reliably for decades.

Q: You later moved into executive leadership at Henkels & McCoy. What changed for you professionally during that period?

At Henkels & McCoy, I managed operations and business development across more than 35 utility clients in the western United States. The scale was much larger, and leadership became a bigger part of my role.

I learned that strong execution depends on strong people. You can have excellent technical systems, but if you do not invest in project managers, engineers, foremen, and safety leaders, performance eventually suffers.

That is why I always emphasise investing in people before projects. When you build strong people, they build strong projects.

Q: What has been your focus as CEO of Parkia, Inc.?

Since becoming CEO in 2014, my focus has been disciplined growth and reliable execution. Parkia specialises in high-voltage underground transmission and distribution systems, and we have delivered major projects ranging from 69kV to 230kV for utilities including LADWP, Southern California Edison, PG&E, SDG&E, and APS.

These projects involve engineering, procurement, construction, safety management, budgeting, and coordination across multiple stakeholders. My role is to make sure all those moving parts stay aligned.

Q: How do you manage complexity across large infrastructure projects?

I rely heavily on visibility and structure. We use dashboards that combine scheduling, cost tracking, field progress, and safety metrics so leadership can identify issues early instead of reacting too late.

Clarity is extremely important in high-risk industries. When everything feels urgent, decision-making suffers. Prioritisation restores clarity.

Q: What are some of the biggest challenges facing the utility industry today?

Infrastructure demand is growing rapidly. Utilities are modernising ageing systems while also responding to increased demand, grid resiliency concerns, and underground transmission expansion.

At the same time, there is increasing pressure around safety, workforce development, and project execution. A large portion of the industry’s experienced workforce is approaching retirement, so developing the next generation of leaders is becoming critical.

Q: What makes a strong leader in high-risk industries?

Consistency. Strong leadership is not about reacting emotionally under pressure. It is about maintaining standards when conditions become difficult.

As a CEO, I am repeatedly responsible for safety, money, people, and decisions that carry major consequences. You cannot lead effectively without discipline and accountability.

I also believe leaders must remain grounded. You do not chase applause. You chase competence, integrity, and permanence.

Q: Looking back, what are you most proud of?

I am proud of the systems we have built, the projects we have completed safely, and the people who have grown within the organisations I have led.

Infrastructure matters because communities depend on it every day, even when they do not see it directly. Knowing that our work contributes to reliable power systems and long-term public infrastructure is meaningful to me.

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Dion Emami on Leadership, Infrastructure and Building Systems That Last

Many small businesses focus on online marketing and neglect the powerful and cost-effective offline marketing right in front of them.

The company car, truck, or van. This vehicle does more than get you from job to job. It parks in high visibility locations, drives through areas where your customers live, and likely remains in view of hundreds (if not thousands) of potential customers every week. But are you making the most of this golden opportunity?

Your Van is a Neighborhood Billboard

When your vehicle is parked outside a customer’s house, something remarkably non-intrusive happens. The neighbor three doors down sees it. The person walking their dog past it twice notices the logo. The family across the road who’ve been meaning to get someone in for the same job for months makes a mental note.

This is the neighborhood billboard effect, and it’s the single most powerful lead-generation tool local service businesses have access to. You’re not interrupting someone on a website they don’t want to be on. You’re just showing up in their actual street and their actual lives, providing social proof in real time. Someone nearby trusted this company enough to hire them. That does most of the selling for you.

What’s at play here, psychologically, is a phenomenon known as subconscious familiarity. People have an extremely strong bias towards businesses they’ve seen before, even if they’ve never actually engaged with them directly. Repeated visibility in a local area builds a kind of ambient trust, so that by the time a homeowner actually needs a plumber or electrician, the company they’ve driven past a dozen times already just feels like a safe, known option. They’re not lucky. You’re just using the compound effect of their own consistent physical presence.

Elevating the Details That Competitors Miss

The branding on a commercial vehicle isn’t just about the logo. The entire vehicle should be treated as a single object. Clean alloys, matching trim, no visible rust on the wheel arches, and a modern registration plate all combine to send a first impression message, quality. The vast majority of service vans get the logo right and then completely undermine it with a weathered, yellowed number plate that looks like it belongs on a vehicle ten years older than it is.

This is where the custom professional plate separates the serious operation from the budget one. Investing in number plates for your company vehicle means every other element of the exterior looks intentional. A clean, quality plate reads as part of a polished corporate identity. An old standard plate reads as an oversight, and customers notice oversights, even when they can’t articulate why one company just “felt” more professional than another.

The whole vehicle is the brand. Not just the panels with the logo on.

The Financial Case For Vehicle Branding

Let’s be real about the economics here. A search engine PPC ad costs money every day it’s up. The instant you turn off the budget, the impressions disappear. An ad wrap is a one-time capital outlay that continues to produce impressions for half a decade.

The math backs this up. Vehicle wraps clock in at about $0.48 per thousand impressions (CPM) while TV ads cost more than $20 per thousand (Outdoor Advertising Association of America). Even against mid-range digital the contrast can be stark. A wrapped van provides thousands of impressions every week without doing anything, just by driving around town, you don’t have to schedule media placement, hope your ad is near the top of the rotation, or selected from a dozen other ads.

That wrap, presuming it’s well designed, will last half a decade to seven years. Divide the total amount you paid for it by the number of times it’s seen over that timespan and you probably have image advertising nearly for free. No desperate last-second bidding on turning customers at the most expensive, least productive point in their buying journey. No having to re-up your ad campaign every three months because they got sick of seeing it. The wrap will be every bit as effective on Day 1 as Day 900.

This doesn’t mean totally ditching your digital ads, it means learning where each advertising medium shines. Let the PPC ads capture demand. Let the van slowly, steadily, create that demand in the first place, right in the neighborhood you work in.

Fleet Uniformity Projects Scale

The way people perceive a single branded van is quite different from the way they perceive three uniformly branded vans. The first one is usually seen as a single trader, while the three are seen as a company.

The consistency of a fleet is important, even if it is a small one. If a customer sees your van in their street on Monday and then their colleague’s street on Thursday, and the two vans have different logos, colors, or contact details, one with an old-style decal, and the other with a new wrap, it will make them think you are unestablished and disorganized.

A business that has two or three vehicles that are styled exactly the same, following the brand guidelines to the letter, looks like a regional operation with systems and structure. And that’s the kind of business that a homeowner will give the key to their home to. The job, after all, involves their boiler, their roof, or their electrics. Scale equals reliability in the mind of the homeowner, and reliability will turn a browser into a caller.

What High-Converting Vehicle Design Actually Looks Like

There are some basic rules for good vehicle graphics that lots of local businesses choose to ignore.

It has to be readable at speed. A passing driver has two to three seconds to read what’s on a vehicle. That means large logo, high contrast colors, and one piece of information beyond the business name. Either a phone number or a search prompt. Not both, not a website URL, not a list of services.

Color contrast isn’t optional. A dark logo on a dark van disappears. White text on a bright trade color, red, green, blue, orange, reads instantly. The logo should be large enough to be legible from ten meters away, not the tasteful small size that looks good on a business card.

Text should be minimal. “Smith’s Heating – Search Smith’s Heating Northfield” tells someone everything they need. An address, four service categories, a social media handle, and a tagline tells them nothing, because they can’t absorb it in the time they have.

Bridging Your Van to Digital Search

The most effective practical change in vehicle graphics many trade businesses could make is swapping out the website URL for a search prompt. URLs are hard to remember, impossible to type while driving, and often break with every website host change or rebrand. A search phrase, “Search \[Brand Name\] \[Your Town\]”, does something more powerful.

It sends an interested viewer straight to your Google Business Profile, your website, your reviews, and any news coverage you might have. It sends search queries with your brand in it, which tells search engines real humans are trying to locate your business. That’s good for local SEO. Physical vehicle presence leaves a digital search scent and that multiplies over time.

The simpler and more memorable the brand name, the better this works. If your business name is something distinctive and local, a seen-in-the-street moment can turn into a Google search within hours.

The Cost of Neglected Vehicle Aesthetics

A dirty van with a faded decal isn’t just a bad advert for the business. It’s actively damaging it.

That homeowner watching a scruffy, mud-splattered vehicle pull up outside their house? The first judgment they make is about standards. If the operator doesn’t take care over the presentation of a tool they use every single day, why would they take care over the work inside someone’s home? That’s an unfair inference, but it’s a fast one and a universal one.

Damaged or inconsistent branding? That tells a prospective customer the business is struggling, disorganized, underfunded, or simply past its best. A peeling decal, a cracked bumper with an old logo sticker, or a vehicle that obviously hasn’t been cleaned in weeks undoes all your hard work in building trust.

Wash the thing before every week on the job. Replace decals if they’re showing wear. Do prompt repairs. These aren’t expensive commitments but they’re ones most of your rivals won’t make, which is exactly why making them gains you a visible edge.

Hiding Fleet Age Through Consistent Styling

Personalized, or private, registrations have a functional business aspect in addition to looking nice. A private or personal registration removes the age identifier from a vehicle’s number plate, which means a well-maintained five-year-old van stops advertising how old it is to everyone who sees it.

For businesses that don’t turn over fleet vehicles every two or three years, maintaining consistent, high-quality styling along with a private number plate will present as a modern looking vehicle despite its actual age. A clean wrap in this year’s brand colors on a seven-year-old van, along with personalized plate and polished alloys, will read as a current operation with plenty of resources. That same van, with a faded decal and a dated plate, looks like a company in trouble.

Building Brand Standards That Your Team Will Actually Follow

Consistent vehicle presentation isn’t something you achieve through pure goodwill or blind luck, it’s something you need a process for. The easiest way to ensure that process runs is to provide everyone who gets behind the wheel of a company vehicle with a one-page brand standards document.

This should simply cover how the vehicles are to be kept clean, what to do when a graphic or plate is lost or damaged, any driving behavior expectations (because a speeding or tailgating company van is a branding disaster), and the procedure for reporting maintenance issues to ensure they don’t become visible problems.

This doesn’t need to suck the joy out of things. A one-pager, touched on during the onboarding process and maybe up by the time clock too, is enough to ensure that this part of the brand’s reputation is being protected automatically, rather than left to chance or individual interpretation.

The Compounding Effect of Taking it Seriously

Vehicle branding isn’t a one-time decision. It’s an ongoing commitment that pays returns over years. The businesses that get this right don’t just look better than their competitors – they appear in the mental shortlist of local customers before those customers have even started searching. That’s a position that’s difficult to buy through digital advertising alone, and almost impossible to reach without showing up physically, consistently, and well.

Start with the van. Then make sure every element of it reflects the standard you want customers to associate with your work.

Read more
Why Consistent Vehicle Styling Is the Most Underrated Asset in Local Business Marketing

The global commercial and enterprise technology matrix is undergoing an aggressive operational transformation driven by remote workforce scaling, cloud-based data decentralization, and intense digital platform fragmentation.

Across multiple hyper-competitive corporate sectors, business operations managers, project coordinators, and executive teams are forced to interact with an overwhelming volume of SaaS platforms, communication channels, and internal administrative databases every business cycle. When essential operational links, vendor management systems, and corporate tool directories are left unorganized, companies face a hidden drain on productivity known as navigational friction. When employees spend valuable minutes searching for valid system entries or navigating through expired URLs, total operational velocity drops. In this hyper-complex digital ecosystem, deploying specialized web curation tools and centralized directory networks has become a mandatory prerequisite for preserving corporate efficiency.

The Growing Challenge of Navigational Friction in Modern Enterprises

To fully grasp the macroeconomic necessity of systematic internal navigation architecture, enterprise executives must analyze contemporary workplace behaviors and data-discovery workflows. The legacy habit of relying on manual bookmarks or broad public search queries is demonstrably inefficient when cross-functional teams require immediate, secure access to active database coordinates or specialized B2B service networks. Mainstream commercial search algorithms are fundamentally fine-tuned to prioritize corporate advertising spend over strict functional utility, frequently burying niche software interfaces or localized utility tools beneath heavy layers of promotional marketing and commercial noise. This structural lag directly compromises operational agility, driving up administrative overhead while exposing corporate web browsers to serious cybersecurity vulnerabilities like credential-harvesting phishing networks and rogue domain redirects.

Human-Curated Directories as Enterprise Navigation Infrastructure

This systemic bottleneck within traditional enterprise data management has accelerated the international corporate adoption of highly structured link indexes and verified knowledge hubs. Rather than operating on automated scraping scripts that prioritize ad monetization, these dedicated enterprise directories function as precise, human-verified roadmaps for specialized industries. By merging professional database validation with a clear, hierarchical taxonomy matrix, these platforms archive active web connections into intuitive, intent-driven classifications. This clean architectural framework ensures that when an enterprise employee seeks explicit data interfaces, communication tools, or technical frameworks, they can completely bypass the digital clutter and hidden security risks of generic browsing channels.

For high-performing organizations and tech-savvy enterprise leaders demanding a premium, highly secure method for tracking these fluid digital coordinates, integrating an authoritative Jusomenu portal into their regular administrative routing establishes an exceptionally stable baseline for team connectivity. These centralized curation dashboards continuously monitor live server updates, backend server migrations, and alternative gateway configurations, successfully eliminating the widespread workplace frustration associated with broken hyperlinks. Because these reference directories are constantly managed by active network participants, they deliver a degree of database accuracy and operational agility that fully automated crawling engines simply cannot mirror in the current B2B technological landscape.

Security, Taxonomy, and the Economic Value of Curated Networks

Jonson jay: Furthermore, the overall economic value of these structured curation hubs is rooted deeply in their strict internal security verification and taxonomy protocols. A premium business index does not simply host a collection of raw destination hyperlinks; it meticulously screens them based on historical domain safety, uptime consistency, and user data privacy profiles.

Consequently, administrative teams that utilize trusted Juso-moeum networks can smoothly transition from chaotic, unverified web browsing to direct, purposeful platform execution within a matter of a few precise clicks. This deliberate architecture radically upgrades the protective parameters of the corporate user journey, effectively isolating enterprise browsers from duplicate spam farms and cross-site scripting vulnerabilities that routinely target uncurated web lists.

The Future of Enterprise Web Navigation Architecture

In conclusion, the modernization of web navigation architecture directly mirrors the evolution of corporate ERP software built to coordinate industrial supply chains. As standard data networks continue to prioritize advertising revenue over authentic user utility, specialized human-curated directories successfully restore structural order, transparency, and instant accessibility to the global business environment. Referencing a verified, active web matrix ensures that specialized utility portals remain visible and seamlessly reachable for the precise professional demographics that depend on them daily. By beautifully balancing software efficiency with an intuitive layout, these modern platforms do far more than index raw hyperlinks—they are fundamentally upgrading how corporate societies interact with the digital workforce.

Read more
Enterprise Productivity Tools: How Curation Infrastructure Streamlines Modern B2B Workflows

Quarterbacks are taught to stay calm when everything around them speeds up. For Ethan LaGuardia, that mindset has shaped more than football. It has shaped the way he approaches school, work, leadership, and life.

LaGuardia, a Connecticut native and quarterback at Nichols College, has built a reputation around consistency. Whether he is leading teammates on the field, studying for classes, or working long days in landscaping during school breaks, he approaches each role with the same steady mindset.

“Consistency is key,” LaGuardia said. “Committing to myself and my future every day is what matters most.”

That mentality has helped him stand out as both a student-athlete and a young leader who understands how discipline in one area of life often carries into another.

Growing Up in South Windsor and Learning Leadership Early

LaGuardia grew up in South Windsor, Connecticut, in a family that valued hard work and resilience. Sports quickly became a major part of his life. He played football, baseball, basketball, and track growing up. By high school, he had become captain of both the football and basketball teams at South Windsor High School.

His senior year, he was named basketball MVP.

Those leadership roles helped shape his approach to teamwork and accountability at an early age.

“Staying calm under pressure and being able to shift courses quickly are huge skills,” he said. “That applies in football, but it also applies in the classroom and work environments.”

His mother, Kimberly Mathog, and his family remain one of his biggest sources of motivation. LaGuardia often points to watching his family overcome challenges as a major influence on his outlook.

“My Mom and my family inspire me,” he said. “Seeing all that she has had to overcome to succeed and how she keeps trying every day motivates me.”

From Anna Maria College to Nichols College Football

After graduating from South Windsor High School in 2023, LaGuardia continued his football career at Anna Maria College before transferring to Nichols College in fall 2025.

The transition represented more than just a change in schools. It became an opportunity to reset goals and push himself academically and athletically.

Today, LaGuardia is a quarterback at Nichols College and a Sports Management major with a projected graduation date of December 2027.

He has also earned recognition in the classroom. He made the President’s List with a GPA above 3.85, earned Academic All Conference honors for fall 2025, and was inducted into the Zeta Alpha Phi Scholastic Honor Society.

For LaGuardia, success in school comes down to structure and measurable goals.

“I use SMART goals and firmly believe that in order to succeed you need measurable goals that you can track daily,” he said.

That process-driven mindset mirrors the way many business leaders approach performance. Small daily habits create long-term results.

Balancing Football, Academics, and Work

While many college athletes focus only on sports, LaGuardia has spent years balancing football with demanding physical work.

For five summers, he has worked for Kelman Landscape, LLC in Manchester, Connecticut. During winter breaks, he also helps with snow removal operations.

The experience has given him perspective on discipline and accountability outside athletics.

Landscaping and snow removal require early mornings, physical endurance, and consistency regardless of weather conditions. Those lessons have carried into other areas of his life.

“Hard work will ultimately breed results,” LaGuardia said. “Trying to stay positive and focus on my faith helps me keep moving forward.”

That practical work ethic has become a major part of his identity. Coaches, professors, and teammates often value athletes who can manage pressure while staying dependable. LaGuardia has built that reputation over time.

Why Faith and Service Matter to Ethan LaGuardia

Community service has also remained important throughout LaGuardia’s journey.

After receiving confirmation through the Catholic Church in 2022, he completed community service work that included cooking meals for people in need. He also helped raise money for Thanksgiving meals through South Windsor High School football programs.

At both Anna Maria College and Nichols College, he volunteered alongside teammates to read to elementary school students.

For LaGuardia, leadership is not only about performance. It is also about making a positive impact on others.

“Success is defined as making a difference in the lives of others while living in alignment with my personal values, passions and purpose,” he said.

That perspective has helped him stay grounded while balancing the demands of athletics, academics, and work responsibilities.

Ethan LaGuardia’s Focus on the Future

As LaGuardia continues working toward his Sports Management degree, football remains a major passion. But his long-term focus extends beyond the field.

The skills he continues developing, including communication, adaptability, discipline, and leadership under pressure, are traits valued across business, athletics, and management industries.

He approaches the future the same way he approaches a football game: prepared, focused, and steady.

“Being able to read the field in football and people in the classroom or work environment is important,” he said. “You have to stay adaptable.”

At a time when many young athletes struggle to balance competing priorities, LaGuardia has built a reputation around consistency and accountability. Those qualities continue to define his path both on and off the field.

Read more
Ethan LaGuardia’s Playbook for Leadership and Consistency

Big ideas do not always arrive with headlines or fanfare.

Sometimes they show up as habits.

For Oregon maritime ferry operator Suzanne Carlson, one idea has shaped nearly every stage of her career: preparation creates opportunity.

That belief helped her move from a young girl fascinated by boats in Coos Bay to a respected ferry operator responsible for transporting passengers safely through some of the Pacific Northwest’s most challenging waterways.

“The water teaches you something every day,” Carlson says. “You can never stop learning, and you can never stop preparing.”

Her story is not about dramatic breakthroughs. It is about turning simple ideas into consistent actions and building a career one crossing at a time.

How Suzanne Carlson Started Her Maritime Career

Carlson grew up in Coos Bay, Oregon, where the water was part of everyday life.

She spent her childhood watching fishing boats leave before sunrise and return later in the day. Weekends often included exploring tide pools and spending time around local marinas.

“I was always drawn to the water,” she says. “I loved watching vessels move through the harbor and wondering how everything worked.”

Those early experiences inspired her to pursue maritime training after high school. She enrolled in maritime studies programs and earned certifications in navigation, emergency operations, firefighting, and passenger safety.

More importantly, she developed a mindset that would guide her entire career.

“The biggest lesson I learned early on was that preparation matters,” Carlson says. “The better prepared you are, the better decisions you can make.”

What Big Idea Helped Suzanne Carlson Advance?

Carlson did not begin her career as a ferry operator.

She started as a deckhand.

The position gave her firsthand experience with vessel maintenance, docking procedures, passenger interaction, and crew responsibilities. It also gave her a close look at what separated effective leaders from average ones.

She noticed that the strongest operators rarely relied on talent alone.

Instead, they relied on preparation.

“You could see the difference,” she says. “The best people were always thinking ahead.”

That observation became one of the defining ideas of her career.

As she gained experience and earned additional certifications, Carlson focused on developing the skills that would allow her to take on greater responsibility. Eventually, she advanced into ferry operations and vessel leadership.

Today, she is responsible for navigating routes where weather, fog, tides, and currents can change quickly.

Why Preparation Is a Competitive Advantage

Many people think operating a ferry is simply about steering a vessel.

Carlson says the reality is much more complex.

Every crossing involves weather monitoring, navigation planning, crew coordination, passenger safety, and risk management.

“The job starts long before you leave the dock,” she says.

One example involves coastal fog, which can appear quickly and dramatically reduce visibility.

Carlson completed simulator-based training designed to prepare operators for low-visibility conditions and complex navigation scenarios.

“When visibility disappears, preparation becomes everything,” she says. “You fall back on your training and your habits.”

That commitment to preparation has helped her build a reputation for calm leadership and sound decision-making.

Colleagues often describe her as someone who remains steady when conditions become difficult.

“People pay attention to how you respond under pressure,” Carlson says. “Staying calm helps everyone around you stay focused.”

How Leadership Developed Through Experience

Another idea that has influenced Carlson’s career is the belief that leadership starts with responsibility.

As she moved into positions with greater authority, she realized leadership was less about giving instructions and more about setting an example.

“I learned that people watch what you do more than what you say,” she says.

Today, she frequently helps newer crew members develop confidence and strong safety habits.

Her approach focuses on communication, accountability, and consistency.

“A lot of success comes from doing small things well every day,” Carlson says.

That philosophy reflects the reality of maritime work, where attention to detail often matters more than dramatic actions.

Life Beyond the Water

Outside of work, Carlson enjoys cycling throughout Oregon’s coastal and inland landscapes.

She says biking provides both physical challenge and mental clarity.

“It’s a different way to stay connected to the environment,” she says.

She is also passionate about coastal photography and documenting the natural beauty of Oregon’s waterways.

Those interests reinforce another idea that has become important to her career: appreciation for the environment.

“The waterways support communities, businesses, wildlife, and transportation,” Carlson says. “The more time you spend on the water, the more you understand how connected everything is.”

What Suzanne Carlson’s Career Can Teach Others

Looking back, Carlson believes her success has been shaped by simple principles rather than complicated strategies.

Preparation. Consistency. Continuous learning.

Those ideas helped her advance from deckhand to ferry operator and become a trusted professional in Oregon’s maritime community.

“There is no substitute for showing up prepared,” she says.

For Carlson, the biggest idea was never revolutionary.

It was practical.

And through years of steady work, that idea helped her build a meaningful career navigating Oregon’s waterways while contributing to the safety and reliability of the communities that depend on them.

Sometimes the most powerful ideas are also the simplest.

Read more
Suzanne Carlson and the Power of Preparation

Gene Kwon has spent his career building companies by solving problems, creating strong partnerships, and staying focused on long-term growth.

From his early days as a competitive tennis player to his rise as an award-winning entrepreneur, his path has been shaped by discipline, teamwork, and adaptability.

Today, Kwon is known for helping launch and grow businesses across logistics, technology, and operations. Along the way, he has earned respect not only for his business success but also for the way he approaches leadership.

“I’ve always believed that good businesses start by helping people solve real problems,” Kwon says. “If you stay focused on that, growth usually follows.”

Early Life and Tennis Shaped Gene Kwon’s Work Ethic

Kwon grew up in both Oregon and Utah, where sports played a major role in his life from a young age. He became a ranked junior tennis player and quickly learned the value of consistency, preparation, and mental focus.

“Tennis teaches you accountability,” he says. “When you’re on the court, there’s nobody else to blame. You learn how to adjust and keep moving forward.”

That mindset carried into his years at the University of Washington in Seattle. In 1991, Kwon joined the university’s Men’s Tennis Team while balancing academics and campus life. He also became a member of the Sigma Chi Fraternity, where he built friendships and leadership skills that would stay with him long after graduation.

Looking back, Kwon says the experience taught him how to work with different personalities and stay calm under pressure.

“Being part of a team environment helped me later in business,” he explains. “Companies only grow when people trust each other and work toward the same goals.”

Building Companies Through Innovation and Partnerships

After college, Kwon entered the business world with an entrepreneurial mindset. Over the years, he became involved in several ventures that focused on improving operations and creating practical solutions for businesses.

One of his most recognized roles was as Partner and Co-Founder of Move Method. The company focused on innovation and business growth strategies during a time when many industries were rapidly changing.

Kwon later co-founded eHub, a company designed to help businesses manage shipping and logistics more efficiently. As e-commerce and online operations expanded, logistics became a growing challenge for many companies. Kwon saw an opportunity to simplify that process.

“There were businesses spending too much time and money trying to manage shipping,” he says. “We wanted to create solutions that made operations easier and more efficient.”

His work with eHub helped position the company within a competitive and fast-moving industry. It also reinforced his reputation as someone who could identify business opportunities early and build teams around them.

Kwon was also involved with RealVu Technologies, where he contributed to technology development and business strategy efforts. His work across several industries reflects an ability to adapt to changing markets while staying focused on long-term goals.

Ernst & Young Award Recognized Entrepreneurial Success

Kwon’s leadership and business accomplishments earned national recognition over the years. He received the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, one of the most respected honors in the business world.

The award recognizes innovation, leadership, and company growth. For Kwon, the recognition reflected years of persistence and teamwork.

“No business succeeds because of one person,” he says. “The best leaders know how to build great teams and give people the opportunity to grow.”

He was also named a recipient of a Forty Under Forty Business Award, highlighting his impact as an emerging business leader earlier in his career.

Even with those achievements, Kwon says he still approaches business with the same mindset he had when starting out.

“You can’t get too comfortable,” he says. “Markets change. Technology changes. You have to keep learning.”

Leadership in the Shipping and Logistics Industry

Beyond his own companies, Kwon has remained active within the broader business community. He is a member and board member of the Package Shippers Association, where he shares industry knowledge and supports collaboration across the shipping and logistics sector.

His involvement reflects another key part of his leadership style: mentorship.

“I’ve learned a lot from people who were willing to share their experience with me,” Kwon says. “I think it’s important to do the same for others.”

Colleagues often describe him as someone who values relationships as much as results. Throughout his career, he has focused on building partnerships that last beyond short-term business goals.

Life Outside of Business Keeps Him Balanced

Outside the office, Kwon still makes time for the activities he has enjoyed since his younger years. Tennis remains a lifelong passion, while skiing and golf help him stay active and recharge.

For Kwon, those hobbies are more than recreation. They also reinforce the importance of patience, discipline, and balance.

“Sports remind you that improvement takes time,” he says. “Business works the same way. Success usually comes from showing up consistently over the long run.”

As industries continue to evolve, Gene Kwon remains focused on growth, innovation, and building strong teams. His career reflects a steady commitment to leadership, adaptability, and solving real-world business challenges — lessons that continue to shape both his work and the people around him.

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Gene Kwon: Building Businesses Through Leadership

Picture a freelancer settling into a quiet evening after a long day of client calls, reaching for their tablet to access a favourite series or interactive experience.

The transaction completes in seconds through an unfamiliar yet seamless method, sparking curiosity about the people behind these invisible systems. Founders working on alternative payment layers for digital entertainment services are reshaping how users connect with content, often incorporating crypto payments to open doors to varied options, including a non gamstop casino that draws on offshore licensing models. Over time these innovators have drawn from personal frustrations with slow bank transfers and hidden fees, turning those pain points into opportunities for smoother digital leisure. Many began by building simple prototypes on kitchen tables, testing small transactions with friends before scaling to real users who wanted instant access to games or shows without traditional hurdles.

Early Experiments with Digital Transactions

Many of these entrepreneurs started in small teams, testing ways to move money across borders without the delays common in traditional banking. One founder focused on creating modular payment tools that could slot into existing apps, allowing smoother access to leisure content. Their work emphasised speed and privacy, traits that appealed to users exploring entertainment beyond conventional channels. Early trials often involved cross-continental transfers for independent creators who needed reliable payouts from global audiences. These experiments revealed gaps in legacy systems, prompting the development of lightweight APIs that integrated easily with mobile wallets. Founders spent countless evenings debugging code and gathering feedback from beta users who valued discretion above all else. The process taught them that reliability mattered more than flashy features, leading to iterative improvements that prioritised seamless checkout flows. Users reported fewer issues with failed payments, which encouraged more frequent engagement with their preferred services.

Learning from Business Alumni Paths

Success often stems from combining technical skills with lessons from established programmes. Research shared through Alumni Stories – Kathryn Baker highlights how structured education helped several innovators refine their approaches to scalable financial infrastructure. Graduates frequently cite the value of case studies on emerging markets, where flexible payment solutions opened new revenue streams for creative industries. Networking events also played a key role, connecting aspiring founders with mentors who had navigated regulatory shifts in fintech. These experiences encouraged a balanced view that blended technical ambition with practical business planning. This educational foundation proved invaluable when tackling complex issues like cross-border compliance and user trust building.

Crypto Integration in Entertainment Tools

Cryptocurrency soon entered the picture as a natural extension. Founders developed layers that handle digital currencies alongside fiat options, reducing friction for international audiences. This flexibility supports entertainment services offering diverse games and experiences, all while maintaining compliance with varied licensing frameworks such as those seen in Malta or Curaçao. Users in remote regions particularly appreciated the borderless nature of these solutions, which bypassed lengthy verification processes. Integration often started with popular tokens before expanding to stablecoins that shielded participants from sudden price swings. Developers ran extensive simulations to ensure transactions remained fast even during peak viewing hours. Over months of refinement, the systems evolved to include optional anonymity features that still met basic audit requirements in key jurisdictions. Many users found these options particularly useful during times of economic uncertainty in their home countries.

Profiles of Notable Payment Innovators

One profile stands out in the streaming space. ND Founders Profile #110: This Musical Founder Creates His Own Starring Role with Transformative Streaming App Tambr illustrates how a background in performance translated into building payment solutions tailored for creative content distribution. Another entrepreneur began with gaming add-ons before expanding into broader digital services. Their system now powers payments for interactive titles and live events, drawing on blockchain to verify transactions quickly and securely across regions. Additional stories reveal founders who transitioned from music production or app design, applying creative problem-solving to financial tools. They often share how early setbacks with investor pitches strengthened their resolve to focus on user-centric design. Collaboration with artists and developers helped shape features that felt intuitive rather than technical.

Scaling Challenges and Market Reach

Growth brought hurdles around volatility in crypto values and differing regulatory landscapes. Teams responded by designing hybrid models that buffer users from fluctuations while expanding reach to UK audiences seeking fresh leisure choices. These layers prioritise user control, enabling access to entertainment that operates independently of domestic restrictions. Tuck MBA alumni insights offered practical frameworks for managing risk during expansion phases. Founders also invested in educational resources for users new to digital currencies, creating simple guides that explained wallet setup without jargon. Market testing in multiple countries revealed preferences for certain tokens and highlighted the need for localised support teams. Partnerships with regional influencers helped build trust among sceptical audiences wary of new financial technology.

Future Directions for Payment Technology

Looking ahead, these founders continue iterating on security features and user interfaces. Their efforts point toward even more integrated systems where payments feel as natural as the content itself, supporting a wider array of digital experiences that blend technology with everyday enjoyment. Tambr streaming app founder demonstrates ongoing innovation in this space. Future updates may incorporate AI-driven fraud detection and voice-activated confirmations for hands-free access during viewing sessions. Sustainability also features in discussions, with some teams exploring energy-efficient blockchain alternatives. Community forums allow users to suggest improvements directly, fostering a sense of shared ownership over the evolving tools. As adoption grows, these payment layers could underpin entirely new forms of interactive leisure that reward creators more fairly through transparent micro-transactions.

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Entrepreneurs Building Fresh Payment Layers for Digital Leisure

A young founder sits at a small kitchen table late one evening, jotting down ideas for a staff gathering that might lift morale after months of long hours.

The list includes simple food, a few activities and perhaps a shared digital experience that everyone can enjoy together without leaving the office. As the business grows, these moments become more common, yet they also raise questions about where the money comes from and how payments are handled smoothly. Leisure start-ups often look at flexible digital options such as casinos not on gamstop when planning low-cost virtual activities that fit tight early budgets. Many also consider how such choices reflect wider efforts to keep teams motivated during uncertain early trading periods.

Early Funding Decisions Shape Leisure Plans

Many leisure-sector start-ups begin with modest seed capital or small business loans. Owners quickly learn that entertainment budgets for team events must sit alongside everyday costs such as equipment and marketing. Careful allocation at this stage prevents later shortfalls and keeps staff engagement high. Conversations with investors often focus on demonstrating that planned activities deliver measurable returns in team cohesion and productivity. Founders frequently prepare detailed spreadsheets that separate core operational spending from discretionary entertainment lines, making it easier to show how even modest outlays on group activities can improve retention rates. Early-stage businesses also discover that investors appreciate seeing contingency plans for unexpected rises in venue or catering prices, which helps maintain credibility during initial pitches. This preparation often includes scenario planning for different economic conditions that might affect overall spending power.

Balancing Cash Flow for Group Activities

Once initial finance is secured, attention turns to day-to-day spending. Leisure businesses frequently explore flexible online payment options to settle bills for venues, catering and shared digital entertainment. These choices allow founders to spread costs across weeks or months rather than facing large upfront demands. Research on leisure activities shows that smaller firms using adaptable payment arrangements report steadier cash positions throughout the year. In practice this might mean setting up rolling subscriptions for online team-building tools or negotiating staged payments with local restaurants. Many owners also track weekly cash-flow forecasts that flag upcoming entertainment commitments, reducing the risk of last-minute borrowing. Over time these habits create a buffer that lets the business respond to seasonal dips without cancelling planned staff events. Such routines prove especially useful when unexpected opportunities arise to host additional low-key gatherings.

Building Investment Cases Around Staff Events

When seeking further rounds of funding, founders often highlight how team events contribute to company culture. Presentations to potential backers include breakdowns of past gatherings and projected costs for future ones. Investors respond well to clear evidence that entertainment spending supports retention in a competitive labour market. A single well-run evening can become part of the wider narrative used to attract new capital. Detailed case studies showing before-and-after staff satisfaction scores often strengthen these arguments. Founders may also compare their entertainment spend per employee against industry benchmarks, demonstrating that thoughtful investment in morale yields measurable productivity gains. This level of transparency reassures backers that leisure budgets are managed with the same rigour as marketing or technology outlays. Including staff testimonials within those presentations can further illustrate the positive impact on daily operations.

Payment Methods and Their Role in Budget Control

Start-ups in the leisure field regularly compare different ways to move money for event-related purchases. Some prefer direct bank transfers, while others favour services that allow instant reconciliation across multiple team members. The PSR SMEs Payment Research 2021 highlights how smaller organisations value tools that reduce administrative time. Leisure start-ups that adopt such approaches find it easier to keep entertainment budgets on track without extra staff hours. Additional benefits include clearer audit trails that satisfy both accountants and future investors. Many teams now integrate expense apps directly with accounting software, automatically categorising each transaction so monthly reports require minimal manual input. This efficiency frees founders to focus on creative planning rather than paperwork. Over several quarters the accumulated time savings can be redirected toward refining event ideas that better suit evolving team preferences.

Scaling Events as the Business Grows

As turnover increases, the scope of team activities tends to expand. Larger groups may require more sophisticated coordination, from booking multiple experiences to managing shared contributions. Founders report that clear financial oversight remains essential even when budgets grow. Guidance such as the Small Business Finance Markets 2024/25 helps owners understand how evolving finance options can support these scaled plans without disrupting core operations. At this stage businesses often introduce formal approval processes for larger events, ensuring every pound spent aligns with company values. Some also explore sponsorship opportunities or partnerships with local venues to stretch budgets further. Regular reviews of past events help identify which formats deliver the strongest return on investment, allowing teams to refine future programmes accordingly. These reviews sometimes reveal simple adjustments that improve both enjoyment and cost efficiency.

Keeping Entertainment Spending Transparent

Transparency with both staff and investors builds trust around entertainment budgets. Regular updates showing how funds are used encourage open discussion about which activities deliver the most value. Leisure start-ups that maintain this openness often find it simpler to justify further investment when the next round of funding discussions begins. Over time, these habits turn occasional team events into a reliable part of sustainable business growth. Sharing anonymised feedback after each gathering further strengthens the case for continued support. When staff see that their preferences influence future choices, participation and enthusiasm tend to rise. Ultimately this culture of openness helps embed entertainment spending as a strategic tool rather than an optional extra, supporting long-term company resilience.

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Funding Team Entertainment in UK Leisure Start-Ups

Over the last two decades Dubai has cemented itself as one of the world’s leading finance and trade hubs. Though shaken by recent regional crisis, it has remained resilient.

However, when complex and politically sensitive disputes become entangled with its financial institutions, the threat to its reputation becomes more acute.

The Port Fund dispute is a case in point.

Similar multi-jurisdictional disputes have tested other financial centers. The Guernsey-registered fund Carlyle Capital Corporation Ltd (CCC) collapsed in 2008 following the financial crash, losing $1 billion in capital. Like The Port Fund, it also spanned multiple jurisdictions, including Guernsey and New York, but was eventually resolved through established legal processes.

Such cases underline that capital moves rapidly and globally. Accountability does not follow a single jurisdiction.

Against this backdrop and as Kuwait Ports Authority v. Port Link saw oral closings on 7 May in the Grand Court of the Cayman Islands, the focus shifts to what role the UAE played.

The Port Fund: Promise for Kuwait

The Port Fund represented a new age of long-term economic stability for Kuwait through development projects and public capital allocation. This potential, however, remains unrealized.

Instead, the Fund, a private equity vehicle run by The Port Link and invested in by the state-owned Kuwait Port Authority (KPA) and Public Institution for Social Security (PIFSS), has become entangled in a dispute concerning the alleged misappropriation of nearly half-a-billion dollars.

At the heart of the case lies KGL Investment (KGLI), the firm responsible for overseeing the Port Fund’s complex operations, its chief executive Maria (Marsha) Lazareva and chairman, Saeed Dashti who were arrested on embezzlement charges. Although the initial conviction was overturned, Lazareva was found guilty of money laundering and misappropriation of Kuwaiti public funds.

Dubai’s Financial Role in the Port Fund Dispute: Noor Bank, Clark Global City and Cross-Border Capital Flows

A key component to understanding the story comes with The Port Fund’s sale of the lucrative Clark Global City investment in the Philippines for nearly $500 million. The Gulf Investment Corporation (GIC), a government-owned financial organization minority partner in the Port Fund, brought a court application against the Port Fund alleging that financial records from the Philippines showed the true figure was in fact closer to $1 billion.

At the time, The Port Fund’s $500 million had been frozen by Dubai-based Noor Bank following concerns raised by Kuwaiti authorities of alleged embezzlement by senior figures.

The matter of what should happen to these frozen funds reached the highest levels of political authority. Kuwait’s Prime Minister High Highness Sheikh Jaber al Mubarak al Hamad al Sabah sent a formal letter to the UAE’s Prime Minister His Highness Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum requesting the return of the cash, alleging financial harm to state entities and investors.

However, Dubai’s officials refused immediate release of the money, stating it would remain frozen pending legal determinations linked to the ongoing investigation.

Dubai, as a booming global financial hub, is accustomed to facilitating complex international financial flows. Yet, this dispute’s multijurisdictional nature, spanning Kuwait, the Cayman Islands and Dubai, adds a layer of complexity that makes accountability far harder to trace. Concerningly, it obscures who controls capital and makes key operational decisions.

Yet, this did not deter GIC from questioning why proceeds from the Clark Global City sale were moved to an account at Noor Bank held in The Port Link’s name, rather than the Fund’s usual bank accounts: HSBC or Al Ahli Bank in Kuwait.

The scrutiny over these transfers underscores Dubai’s centrality to the Fund’s financial architecture, placing the UAE in a delicate position.

It was never wholly external to the Fund’s ecosystem, yet Dubai’s financial institutions were at the heart of freezing the assets. Whilst nothing is inherently wrong with this arrangement, it has forced the UAE to balance impartial enforcement with the perception of favoritism toward its own financial ecosystem and interests.

Ultimately, the Port Fund dispute highlights how cross-border financial structures disperse accountability across multiple jurisdictions, complicating efforts to trace control over capital flows and decision-making. This dynamic places financial hubs such as Dubai at the center of both legal enforcement and reputational scrutiny and leaves Kuwait to bear the burden of pursing resolution across fragmented legal systems.

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The Missing Millions: The Port Fund, Dubai’s Noor Bank and the Cost for Kuwait

In recent times, the business landscape has seen a surge in acquisitions involving firms that blend technology with innovative forms of digital entertainment.

These moves often involve operators leveraging digital currencies to reach wider audiences and enter fresh territories. As larger players seek growth beyond established boundaries, smaller operators find themselves at the centre of deals that reshape how entertainment options evolve. The momentum builds as investors recognise the potential for combining established media reach with flexible digital payment systems that appeal to users seeking seamless experiences. Over the past year alone, several mid-sized operators have reported double-digit increases in active users after adopting crypto options, showing how these integrations can accelerate adoption in competitive markets while also opening doors to fresh content formats that keep audiences engaged longer.

For those exploring alternative entertainment avenues, a non gamstop casino represents one such expansion in options that prioritises user discretion and modern transaction methods. Many players appreciate the reduced barriers and faster processing times that come with these services, especially when compared with traditional banking routes that can involve lengthy verification steps. This flexibility often translates into more time spent enjoying the experience itself rather than handling administrative hurdles.

Early Signs of Consolidation

The pattern of consolidation first became visible when consumer technology groups began purchasing niche operators focused on interactive content. These acquisitions typically centred on businesses already using digital currencies for seamless transactions across borders. Entrepreneurs running modest ventures noticed that joining larger entities brought access to better infrastructure and broader reach without losing the core appeal of privacy-focused experiences. Industry observers point to several high-profile examples where founders retained creative control while gaining marketing budgets that previously seemed out of reach. This shift has encouraged more startups to explore similar partnerships rather than pursuing independent growth at a slower pace.

One recurring thread in these stories is the founder’s journey from local experiments to international scale. What starts as a simple idea for engaging leisure quickly gains momentum once paired with established capital and technical expertise. The result is often a more robust service that still feels personal to its original audience.

Crypto Integration in New Ventures

Digital currencies play a central role in making these expansions viable. They allow operators to serve audiences who value speed and reduced paperwork. Recent media investments show how high-profile names are channelling funds into tokens that support entertainment ecosystems. This trend mirrors the broader shift where privacy and efficiency become selling points for both businesses and their customers. Truth Social crypto treasury plans demonstrate how established operators are now embedding token strategies directly into their long-term roadmaps.

The same founder narrative continues here. Early choices about flexible payment systems often determine whether an operator can attract the attention of these larger investors. As token ecosystems mature, the ability to handle cross-border payments without traditional intermediaries becomes a decisive advantage.

Notable Investment Moves

Another wave of activity comes from media firms raising substantial capital specifically for token acquisitions. Trump media firm raises $6.4 billion to invest in Crypto.com’s digital token illustrates how entertainment-adjacent companies are building treasuries that could underpin new leisure offerings. Such moves signal confidence that crypto will underpin future growth in consumer-facing digital experiences. New crypto treasury strategy further underscores the scale of ambition among these groups as they position themselves for the next phase of digital expansion.

The same founder narrative continues here. Early choices about flexible payment systems often determine whether an operator can attract the attention of these larger investors. Market analysts note that these treasury builds often coincide with product updates aimed at improving user retention through loyalty incentives paid in tokens, which in turn helps maintain steady engagement across different user segments.

Regulatory Navigation for Growth

Crossing into new markets requires careful handling of varying rules on data and transactions. Companies that succeed tend to embed privacy measures from the outset. This approach reduces friction for users who prefer minimal checks and supports the higher transaction volumes that larger bonuses and stake limits can generate in competitive environments. Teams that invest early in compliance frameworks often find themselves better equipped to handle sudden regulatory changes without disrupting service.

Opportunities for UK SMEs

Smaller British enterprises stand to benefit when they align with acquirers who understand crypto flows. CoinShares Nasdaq listing highlights one route by which established players gain visibility and funding that can trickle down to niche operators. UK owners often find that adopting similar payment layers opens doors to partnerships previously out of reach. Many report that these collaborations bring not only capital but also valuable insights into scaling operations while maintaining the personal touch that first attracted their users.

The thread of expansion comes full circle when these SMEs begin offering entertainment choices that feel as personal and unencumbered as the original vision. Local operators who embrace these trends frequently discover new revenue streams that help them compete with larger international operators.

Looking Ahead

Overall, the pace of deals suggests crypto-enabled entertainment will keep attracting attention from investors. Businesses that maintain focus on discretion and user choice appear best placed to thrive as the sector matures. The recurring story of founders scaling up while preserving core values offers a useful lens for anyone considering their next move in this space. Continued innovation in token utility and payment speed is likely to drive further interest, particularly among audiences who value both convenience and privacy in their digital leisure activities.

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Acquisitions Fuel Expansion in Crypto Entertainment Sectors

The way people relate to work has changed. With more awareness around personal growth, rights, and work-life balance, people expect their time and their space to be respected.

They want clarity about what is being measured and why. This is why time tracking can feel like a tool meant only for surveillance, and why people have a bad association with it. And for people who feel this way, tools built with respect for them matter most. This is exactly what the WebWork team kept in mind at every step of building WebWork.

WebWork Time Tracker is a time tracking and workforce management platform. It records work hours, tracks activity and productivity, can take screenshots, manages projects and tasks, and handles attendance, timesheets, and payroll in one place. So yes, WebWork is time tracking and employee monitoring software. But the way it is built, and the reason it exists, point somewhere different from that first picture. WebWork is made to help people understand their own work and grow, not to catch them out.

The idea behind WebWork

From the first version of WebWork to every feature we have added since, we have kept employees in mind. Every design choice has passed through the same filter: does this help the person using it day to day? We think of the product as a tool that helps people see their own productivity, work in a way that suits them, and reach their potential. The idea is simple: the person doing the work should benefit from it as much as the person reviewing it. When someone can see where their time goes and understand their own workload, they are in a better position to manage it and improve. When one person grows, the team grows with them. A group of people who feel trusted will always do more than one held together by pressure. That is the result we are building toward, and each team decides for itself how to get there.

How we put this into practice

Built to fit your team

For employees, this is where it starts. The way a tool is set up shapes how a person relates to their work, and small choices in configuration can change how the same tracker feels day to day. We do not think there is one correct level of monitoring for every team. Team culture and the well-being of each person matter, so WebWork is built to be configurable. Each team decides which tools to use and which to leave off.

Screenshots are a good example. A team can take normal screenshots, record short videos instead, or turn captures off completely. It can show a notification each time so the person sees exactly what was captured, or let it run quietly in the background. And it can blur the images for privacy, with an adjustable blur level, or leave them clear. These choices can apply to the whole workspace, or be set differently for a single project or a single person. The same flexibility extends to activity tracking, app and website monitoring, and the other features in the platform. The point is not how much you can monitor. It is that each team adapts the tools to fit how they actually work, because success comes from every member growing, not from being watched.

Features built for clarity and fairness

With WebWork, everything around work time stays fair and transparent. Hours, leaves, breaks, and everything else can be recorded accurately, which leaves no room for misunderstanding and helps build trust between employees and managers. When records are clear, conversations about work become easier. Nobody has to defend their week from memory, and nobody has to chase down missing hours. WebWork also helps you see your own work and how you grow over time, clearly and transparently: how many hours you actually put in, where your time goes, and how your days compare to one another. You begin to recognize your own rhythm: which days hold steady, which slip, and which weeks carry more weight than others. Patterns that used to feel invisible become something you can use. It is a way to follow your own progress without waiting for someone else to tell you how you are doing. You know your work best, and once you can see it laid out, you are in the best position to manage it, adjust, and improve. That might mean shifting your hardest work to your sharpest hours, taking a real break when you have earned one, or asking for support when the load gets too heavy.

Looking out for overwork, not only low output

This one is squarely on the employee’s side. WebWork’s Work-Life Balance settings are made to encourage healthy habits and prevent burnout. A workspace can define what healthy looks like, then flag when someone drifts outside it. The healthy range is configurable, so a creative agency and a customer support team can each set the lines that fit their own work. It can notice when a person works above a set healthy range, say more than nine hours in a day, or puts in a lot of time outside their scheduled hours. It can also catch when someone goes too long without a break, or keeps their activity high for long stretches with no rest.
When someone crosses one of these lines, they can get a reminder to drink water, stretch, take a walk, or do an eye exercise. When the workday stretches too long, the reminders shift gently toward life outside work, like stepping outside or spending time with family and friends. Managers also get burnout risk indicators that show who may need support, and wellness reports across the workspace make it easier to spot patterns before they become problems. So WebWork does not only point out low productivity. It also points out overwork, and gives clarity on who needs help.

Tools that support motivation

For an employee, motivation is personal. Good results need it, and it grows when people can see their own progress, which is something WebWork is built to give back to the person doing the work. The project time tracker lets each person follow their own work, see what they have finished, and feel the satisfaction of moving something forward. Watching a list of tasks turn into completed work is a small thing, but over a week or a month it adds up to a real sense of progress. People can also compare their own results day to day, notice their stronger and weaker stretches, and set a pace that suits them rather than one imposed from outside.
When you can see your own progress, the motivation usually takes care of itself.

It works from the manager’s side too. The same data that helps a person track themselves also shows managers the real effort going in, which is easy to overlook otherwise. That makes it easier to recognize good work, give credit where it is due, and offer support when someone is struggling rather than only after something has gone wrong. So motivation is encouraged from both sides: the employee sees their own progress, and the manager has an honest basis for supporting and rewarding it.

Security, explained in plain terms

Employees care about this most, and rightly so, and it matters just as much to WebWork. Who can see what comes down to roles. As an employee, you see your own data. Managers see only the teams or projects they are responsible for, and full access sits with the workspace owner. Not everyone can see everything, and that is by design.
Your data is protected with standard security measures. It is encrypted both while it travels and while it is stored, accounts are guarded with hashed passwords, access is limited to authorized people, and the system is regularly audited, penetration tested, and monitored for vulnerabilities. Screenshots get an extra layer on top of this: each one is tagged with its own unique code and then encrypted, so it stays private in storage and in transit.
WebWork also does not use your personal data for automated decisions or profiling that would significantly affect you without a human involved, and any optional data collection, such as for marketing, happens only if you agree to it.
You stay in control of your data. You can ask to see it, get a copy of it, correct it, withdraw your consent at any time, or have it deleted by emailing WebWork. These are your rights under GDPR. Your data is not kept forever either: it is removed or anonymized once it is no longer needed, unless the law requires it to be kept. WebWork does not sell your personal information, and the product meets the main data protection standards, including GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA.

An AI assistant for teams

And alongside all of this, WebWork comes with an AI assistant, WebWork AI, built into the platform and available in WebWork Chat and Slack. Teams can ask it directly about features they are having difficulty with, and talk with it about their productivity, in plain language or even by voice. There is no searching through help articles or digging through reports. Just ask, and the answer is there. WebWork AI can also flag burnout risks before they grow, create tasks, generate summaries, and run team standups on its own, without anyone having to ask. It also notices when work tilts unevenly across a team and surfaces that imbalance early, so it can be addressed before anyone burns out. The patterns it spots come from real team activity, so its insights reflect how the team actually works.

And we keep improving WebWork with employees in mind. They are not an afterthought here. The people using WebWork every day shape where it goes, and we are always glad to hear their concerns and help with any question. Many of the features added over the past year started as a conversation with someone using the platform. Anyone can submit an idea, vote on others, and follow what gets built through our public Feature Requests page. Of 333 requests submitted there, 201 have already been completed. In the end, the people using WebWork are who we work for. If something about WebWork is not working for you, we want to know.

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The Real Idea Behind WebWork: A Time Tracker Built to Help People Grow

The surge in demand for more varied forms of entertainment has drawn significant attention from investors seeking opportunities in innovative leisure solutions for UK audiences.

This interest centres on how fresh approaches can meet changing tastes while opening new avenues for business growth across different sectors. Many audiences now seek experiences that extend beyond conventional offerings, with some exploring a non gamstop casino to access wider selections and flexible payment methods including digital currencies. Such developments align with a guiding idea that innovation and investment thrive when they respond directly to calls for greater variety in how people spend their free time. Over recent years this pattern has become more pronounced as households juggle busy schedules and look for convenient ways to unwind without being tied to fixed schedules or limited catalogues.

Expanding Options Across Leisure Sectors

Businesses in the creative industries have noticed steady shifts in what draws people in, moving away from limited selections toward experiences that offer more personal control. This change encourages entrepreneurs to back ventures that introduce new formats and content styles tailored to UK viewers and participants. The guiding idea surfaces here as investment follows those who can deliver these expanded choices without relying on outdated models. For instance, live events, interactive shows and hybrid digital experiences are gaining traction because they let users shape their own evenings rather than accept whatever is broadcast at a set hour. Smaller producers are experimenting with niche storytelling that reflects regional tastes, from northern comedy sketches to Welsh language dramas, and finding that backers respond positively when the offering feels genuinely fresh. As a result, the leisure landscape is slowly becoming more diverse, with room for both big players and independent creators who understand local preferences.

Flexible Payments and Audience Reach

New payment methods have played a key role in making entertainment more accessible, allowing users to engage through familiar digital tools rather than traditional routes. This flexibility supports broader participation and helps smaller operators compete by reducing barriers that once restricted options. Recent findings on viewing preferences show how spending patterns continue to evolve, reflecting similar pressures across related fields. Analysts note changing habits as households weigh subscriptions against one-off purchases and ad-supported tiers. Many now favour instant access via apps that accept various currencies and quick transfers, which in turn lets operators reach audiences who previously felt excluded by card-only systems or lengthy sign-up processes. The same trend appears in live music and theatre bookings where mobile wallets speed up entry and reduce queues. Overall these tools lower friction and encourage repeat engagement, which benefits both users and the companies that serve them.

Funding Patterns in Creative Ventures

Growth in this area often depends on targeted finance that understands the risks and potential returns of developing fresh entertainment routes. Reports such as Growth Finance for Creative Industries outline how capital flows toward projects that emphasise choice and adaptability, helping UK small and medium enterprises test ideas that might otherwise stay on the drawing board. The guiding idea reappears as investors recognise that supporting variety can lead to stronger returns over time. Creative industries finance insights highlight how patient capital allows producers to refine concepts over several seasons rather than chasing quick hits. This approach proves especially useful for projects that blend technology with storytelling, such as augmented reality experiences or community-driven content. Lenders familiar with the sector also provide mentoring alongside funds, helping teams navigate distribution deals and audience data. In turn this creates a more resilient ecosystem where promising ventures can scale without losing their distinctive edge.

Aligning with National Advancement Plans

Government approaches, including UK Innovation Strategy: leading the future by creating it, stress the value of backing solutions that keep pace with audience expectations. These strategies encourage collaboration between private backers and creative teams to refine offerings that feel current and engaging. In practice this means funding tools and services that let people select from wider menus of activities, reinforcing the core notion that investment succeeds when it widens rather than narrows possibilities. Innovation strategy overview shows how public programmes support skills training and technology adoption that feed directly into entertainment ventures. Partnerships between universities and start-ups are producing new software for content personalisation and secure payment gateways. Regional funds also target areas outside London, spreading opportunity and ensuring that talent from across the UK can contribute ideas. The result is a more joined-up system where policy signals and private money work together to meet evolving leisure demands.

Opportunities for SME Decision Makers

Entrepreneurs running UK businesses can find practical lessons in these trends by watching how successful ventures adapt their models to include more choice. Whether through content partnerships or technology upgrades, the focus remains on meeting demand without unnecessary limits. This approach keeps the guiding idea alive: sustained interest from venture sources will continue to favour those who prioritise flexible, audience-led entertainment over rigid structures. Decision makers who track emerging payment solutions and content formats often spot gaps early, such as demand for family-friendly interactive experiences or short-form regional documentaries. By staying open to feedback and testing small pilots they build loyalty that larger competitors struggle to match. Networking with other founders and attending sector events further helps refine strategies. Over time these adaptive habits translate into steadier growth and stronger relationships with both audiences and investors who value forward-thinking leadership.

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Investment Interest in Broader Entertainment Choices

More than 90 business leaders and MPs have written to Rachel Reeves urging the Chancellor to halt what they call the relentless creep of taxes on Britain’s entrepreneurs, warning that the people who build and scale the country’s companies are increasingly being given a reason to take them elsewhere.

The signatories read like a roll-call of British enterprise. They include Luke Johnson, chairman of Gail’s Bakery; Johnnie Boden, founder of the clothing retailer Boden; Marcel Khan, chief executive of Franco Manca and The Real Greek; and Andreas Adamides, chief executive of Helm. They are joined by 19 MPs, among them Dame Priti Patel, shadow foreign secretary; Andrew Griffith, shadow business and trade secretary; and Chris Philp, shadow home secretary.

The letter has been written by Helm, Britain’s largest network of scale-up founders, and marks the launch of its Stop the Creep campaign. It is the latest sign of a hardening mood among the country’s wealth creators, who have spent much of the past year warning the Chancellor that raising taxes on capital gains would stifle investment.

In November 2025, Reeves told entrepreneurs she wanted to make the United Kingdom the most attractive place in the world to start and scale a business. The signatories argue that the opposite is happening.

Their central charge is one of cumulative damage, a “death by a thousand cuts”. Employers’ National Insurance and capital gains tax on dividends have risen, while Business Asset Disposal Relief, Business Property Relief and Agricultural Property Relief have all been pared back. Business Asset Disposal Relief, the headline relief for founders selling up, has seen its rate climb from 10 per cent to 14 per cent in April 2025 and to 18 per cent from April 2026, close to a doubling of the bill facing those who reach a sale.

The letter sets that record against an unforgiving backdrop. Only four in ten UK businesses reach their fifth birthday, it notes, and while most owners dream of one day selling up and retiring on the proceeds, very few ever do. Of the five million companies registered in Britain, just 1,400 sold for more than £1 million in 2024, according to the Office for National Statistics. For the handful who make it that far, the signatories say, the reward for years of risk and forgone salary is a tax bill that has nearly doubled in two years.

While Britain “tightens the screws” on its founders, the letter argues, rival nations are “rolling out the red carpet”. The United States offers zero tax on the first $10 million of a company sale, and Cyprus, Portugal, the United Arab Emirates and Singapore are all actively courting British founders with low-tax regimes and pro-growth regulation.

The risk, the signatories warn, is that Britain becomes an “incubator economy”, world-class at creating businesses but unable to keep them, a concern they say the Government’s own advisers have raised. It is a fear that runs through much of the recent commentary on the Chancellor’s approach, including research suggesting Reeves’s tax plans could push as many as one in eight UK businesses overseas.

The letter is careful not to write the country off. “We believe Britain remains one of the most entrepreneurial and dynamic countries on Earth,” it states. “Act now, and the Government can still keep its promise, and its scale-up founders. Fail, and Britain will continue training entrepreneurs for export.”

Adamides was unsparing in his assessment. “Britain’s founders take the risks, forgo the salaries and create the jobs that power our economy. Yet the tax system is telling them to leave,” he said. “The relentless creep of taxes on those who scale businesses is corrosive, and it sends exactly the wrong signal to the people we most need to back.

“The Government promised to make the UK the best place in the world to build a business. I want to believe that promise. But warm words won’t keep founders here, only action will.”

The campaign adds to a growing chorus that has repeatedly cautioned the Chancellor against anti-enterprise tax rises ahead of successive fiscal events. With the next Budget on the horizon, the signatories’ message to the Treasury is blunt: stop the creep before Britain loses its founders for good.

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Founders and MPs warn Reeves that Britain’s tax system is telling entrepreneurs to leave

Britain’s entrepreneurs have taken centre stage in the King’s Birthday Honours List 2026, published on Friday evening, with damehoods, knighthoods and a sweep of CBEs, OBEs and MBEs recognising the founders, family firms and FTSE bosses who keep the UK economy moving.

At the top of the list, Jane Fraser, the Scottish-born chief executive and chair of Citigroup, becomes a Dame for services to the financial sector. Citi serves 85 per cent of FTSE 100 companies and has confirmed a $1.5 billion investment in its London headquarters, a notable vote of confidence in the City from the first woman ever to run a major Wall Street bank.

She is joined by fellow Dame Helen Gordon, chief executive of Grainger plc, honoured for services to the property industry after transforming the UK’s largest listed residential landlord into the country’s build-to-rent leader and serving on the government’s New Towns Taskforce.

Sir Alastair King, the immediate past Lord Mayor of London, receives a knighthood for services to pensions reform and the promotion of international business, having driven the Mansion House Accord that secured a £100 billion commitment to private market investment from UK pension providers.

Andrew Mitchell, chief executive of Tideway, is knighted for services to the construction industry after delivering the £5 billion Thames super sewer on time and on budget, while Peter Lord and David Sproxton, who co-founded Aardman Animations in 1976 and built the studio behind Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep into a global force whose films have grossed more than $1 billion, before handing the business to its employees in 2018, both receive knighthoods for services to the animation and creative industries.

There is a striking theme running through the senior business awards: female entrepreneurship. Both co-chairs of the Invest in Women Taskforce, Hannah Bernard, group director of business banking at Nationwide, and serial entrepreneur Deborah Wosskow, are made CBEs for services to female entrepreneurship and access to finance for women. The recognition comes just months after the taskforce surpassed £635 million in commitments for its landmark ‘Women backing Women’ fund.

They are joined by Charlotte Tilbury, sole founder of the beauty empire that bears her name and which sold a controlling stake to Spain’s Puig in a deal valuing it at up to £1 billion, who is upgraded from MBE to CBE for services to the beauty and cosmetics industry.

Other business CBEs include Christopher Hulatt, co-founder of Octopus Group, for services to entrepreneurship; Nigel Terrington, chief executive of Paragon Banking Group; Diana Brightmore-Armour, chief executive of C. Hoare & Co, for services to women and diversity in financial services; Bernard Mensah, president of international at Bank of America; Patrick Heath-Lay, chief executive of People’s Partnership, for services to the pensions industry; Joseph O’Neill, chief executive of Belfast Harbour; Julia Pyke, joint managing director of Sizewell C; David Currie, chair of Aberdeen-headquartered Proserv; and Professor Monder Ram, founder of the Centre for Research in Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship.

For Business Matters readers there is no more cheering name on the list than David Fishwick, the Burnley minibus magnate turned community banker whose decade-long fight to launch Burnley Savings and Loans inspired the hit Netflix film Bank of Dave. He receives an OBE for services to finance, business and charity.

The OBEs are rich in SME success stories: Clare Hornby, founder of fashion brand ME+EM; Neil Clifford, chief executive of Kurt Geiger; Sophie Ross, founder of Trotters Childrenswear; June MacGeachy, co-founder of Glasgow lab-gas maker Peak Scientific; Maitland Mackie, chairman of ice cream maker Mackie’s of Scotland; John Grant, chair of Speyside whisky distiller J. & G. Grant; Ifty Nasir, founder of share-scheme platform Vestd; Philip Newborough, co-founder of Bridges Fund Management; John Paul Harkin, founder of Derry’s Alchemy Technology Services; Catherine Handcock, founder of Creative HEAD; and Chenelle Ansah, chief executive of Nell Consulting, for services to investment and women in business.

Big-company leadership is recognised too, with OBEs for Amazon’s UK country manager John Boumphrey, Unilever chief brand officer Aline Santos, EY managing partner Rohan Malik, and the recently departed chief executives of Rentokil Initial and Dunelm, Andy Ransom and Nick Wilkinson.

Lower down the order of precedence, the MBEs tell the story of Britain’s family businesses: brothers Geoffrey and Martin Agnew, joint executive chairs of Northern Ireland grocery group Henderson, are honoured together, alongside Trevor Annon, chair and managing director of catering group Mount Charles; Geoffrey Ball, owner of Staffordshire flooring adhesives manufacturer F. Ball and Co; Robert Barlow, founder of TDP Recycled Plastic Furniture; chef Andreas Antona, for services to hospitality; and Bukola Babajide, founder of Crystal Options and the Female Techpreneur platform, for services to technology, business and inclusion.

The honours land barely a month after 186 SMEs collected King’s Awards for Enterprise in the scheme’s 60th anniversary year, a reminder, twice over, that from Burnley to the Square Mile, British business is being built by people the establishment is finally learning to celebrate.

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From the Bank of Dave to the boardroom of Citi: business builders honoured in King’s birthday honours 2026

A pocket money app dreamt up by three parents at the school gates has been sold to one of Britain’s biggest banks, in a deal understood to be worth around £180 million.

Barclays confirmed on Friday that it is acquiring the UK arm of GoHenry, the digital platform and prepaid debit card provider that teaches children aged six to 18 how to manage their money.

More than 500,000 British children use the app, which also offers junior ISAs and was founded in 2012 by Louise Hill and two fathers whose children attended the same school. The idea was born when the trio noticed their children racking up sizeable bills on services such as iTunes, spending that only surfaced on their parents’ bank statements. The business is named after the first child to trial its debit card.

While her co-founders have since moved on, Hill has stayed the course. GoHenry was acquired by Californian fintech Acorns three years ago in an all-share deal, a far cry from its crowdfunding days, when it repeatedly smashed targets on Crowdcube. Acorns is now selling the UK business to Barclays while retaining GoHenry’s US operation and its European arm, Pixpay.

Neither side disclosed the price, but Barclays said the transaction would shave around five basis points off its core capital ratio, which, by UBS analysts’ reckoning, points to a consideration of roughly £180 million. The official announcement from Barclays confirmed the deal is expected to complete in the final quarter of this year, subject to regulatory approval.

Hill said she was “thrilled” with the transaction. “I think together with Barclays it means we can reach a lot more kids, which has always been our aim,” she said, declining to comment on whether she stands to profit personally from the sale.

The deal is the latest in a string of acquisitions by Barclays, which has been bulking up its UK operations under chief executive CS Venkatakrishnan, known in the City as Venkat, as part of the turnaround plan he has pursued since taking the helm in November 2021.

The bank struck a £2.3 billion deal for Kensington Mortgages in 2022, bought most of Tesco’s banking business for around £600 million two years later, and last October agreed to acquire Best Egg, an American personal loans provider, for $800 million.

Venkat has chased bigger game, too. Barclays is understood to have bid for TSB last year, losing out to Santander UK, which bought the high street lender from Sabadell for £2.65 billion. It was also pipped by NatWest in this year’s auction for wealth manager Evelyn Partners, sold by its private equity owners for £2.7 billion.

GoHenry UK is not yet profitable. Its latest Companies House accounts show pre-tax losses narrowed to £21.9 million in 2024, from £48 million a year earlier. The company says more than two million children have used its services to learn about money since launch.

The strategic logic is plain enough. Vim Maru, who runs Barclays’ UK division, said the acquisition “will turbocharge our offering for households and families”.

“GoHenry supports our vision to offer a deep and seamless banking experience to customers through all of life’s big moments, whether opening a very first account, saving for retirement, and everything in between,” he said. The bank will retain the GoHenry brand and its standalone app.

There is a well-thumbed playbook here. Rooster, a GoHenry rival, was bought by NatWest in 2021, a deal UBS analysts this week described approvingly, noting: “Management there report a pleasing post-acquisition performance, now serving 15 times more customers than when it was acquired.” More striking still, NatWest discloses a 97 per cent retention rate of younger customers as they move into adulthood.

For the high street banks, children’s money apps are less about pocket money and more about pipeline, capturing customers years before they open their first current account. It is a logic that chimes with long-standing consumer demand for banks to do more on financial education, with half of young Britons saying it is the initiative they most want lenders to invest in.

Hill, for her part, frames it as mission rather than acquisition arithmetic. The sale to Barclays, she said, “enables us to offer GoHenry members a pathway to continue their money journey when they hit 18, because financial education shouldn’t have a start or end date.”

The transaction is expected to complete in the final quarter of this year, Bloomberg reported, subject to the customary regulatory sign-off.

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Barclays snaps up children’s money app GoHenry in £180m bet on customers for life

HMRC will carry out more than 30,000 interventions on Britain’s high streets over the coming year, in what amounts to the most aggressive campaign yet against the vape shops, barbers, candy stores and convenience stores being used as fronts for tax fraud and money laundering.

The scale of the operation, announced as tax officers made unannounced visits to six souvenir shops across central London this week, will worry the organised crime groups that have quietly colonised swathes of the UK’s retail landscape, and should hearten the honest traders who have spent years competing against businesses that simply don’t pay their taxes.

The London raids, carried out alongside Home Office Immigration Enforcement, Westminster Council Trading Standards and the Metropolitan Police, targeted shops selling royal family and London-themed gifts alongside magic and wizarding merchandise. The results give a flavour of what investigators expect to find elsewhere: full till data downloads were completed at every location, with tax compliance enquiries to follow; the Home Office made three arrests for immigration-related offences and issued a £40,000 civil penalty to one business for employing an illegal worker; and Trading Standards seized £5,433 of goods, including 289 disposable vapes, 173 squishy toys, counterfeit bags, hats and scarves, and unsafe travel adapters.

Dan Tomlinson, Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, was unusually blunt for a Treasury minister. “HMRC is stepping up its action to go after illegal activity on our high streets. Owners of dodgy shops that are evading tax: we are coming for you,” he said.

“Too many high streets have been blighted by illegal activity that harms local communities and undercuts honest businesses, and we’re determined to fix this. This is a sustained, nationwide effort, and HMRC and its partners will use every power available to dismantle these criminal networks.”

The interventions planned for 2026/27 will range from unannounced visits and warning letters through to full-blown organised crime investigations and seizures. HMRC says it will target the “controlling minds and enablers” behind high street harm, the people who sit behind networks of shops rather than the staff behind the counter, a notable shift given that prosecutions of tax evasion enablers have fallen 75 per cent in five years, prompting questions over whether HMRC’s enforcement rhetoric has been matched by results.

The campaign will also tackle till fraud, going after both the providers and the end-users of electronic sales suppression tools, software used to manipulate till records to conceal sales, launder money and evade tax. Rogue directors who repeatedly fold companies only to reopen under a new name elsewhere, so-called phoenixing, are also in the department’s sights, alongside National Minimum Wage breaches and the sale of illicit tobacco and vapes.

The firepower behind the push is real. At last year’s Budget, the Chancellor announced a new team of 350 criminal investigators dedicated to tackling evasion by small businesses. Those investigators have now been recruited, and around half of their work is focused specifically on disrupting harmful high street businesses and the people behind them.

That focus on the smaller end of the market is no accident. The National Audit Office has warned that small businesses are now responsible for around 80 per cent of the UK’s tax evasion — a finding that has clearly shaped where HMRC is pointing its new resources.

HMRC is not acting alone. Last month the Home Office launched a new High Street Organised Crime Unit backed by £30 million of funding, bringing HMRC together with other government departments, Trading Standards, policing partners and the National Crime Agency to dismantle the criminal networks undercutting honest businesses. The NCA estimates that around £1 billion of criminal cash is laundered through high street businesses such as mini-marts, barbers and vape stores every year.

The blueprint already exists. November’s Operation Machinize 2, the NCA-led intensification across the UK, saw HMRC deploy more than 160 officers and resulted in 924 arrests and the seizure of £13 million in suspected criminal proceeds.

For legitimate SMEs, the campaign cuts two ways. The promised dismantling of criminal competitors will be welcome on trading estates and high streets where honest operators have been undercut for years. But a step change in compliance activity on this scale inevitably means more honest businesses receiving a knock on the door too, and any owner who does find HMRC on the doorstep would do well to understand how to handle an HMRC investigation before it happens.

The message from the Treasury, though, is aimed squarely at the other kind of shopkeeper. As Tomlinson put it: they are coming for you.

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“We are coming for you”: HMRC declares war on dodgy high street shops with 30,000 raids planned

More than 40 export-ready British small businesses will pitch live to Indian buyers next week, as the Great British Pitch returns for 2026 with a sharpened focus on international growth, and a Downing Street reception hosted by the Chancellor to mark the occasion.

The UK-India event, taking place in central London on 16 June, is the opening fixture in this year’s Great British Pitch series, led by Small Business Britain with support from the Department for Business and Trade. It is designed to convert the political momentum behind the UK-India Free Trade Agreement, and the Prime Minister’s trade delegation to Mumbai last year, into tangible orders for the UK’s 5.7 million small firms.

The case for intervention is stark. Small businesses make up 99 per cent of all UK firms and account for roughly half of private sector turnover, yet government figures published in September 2025 show just 17 per cent currently export at all. Of those that do trade internationally, only 12 per cent sell into India, a striking gap given the scale of one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. It is a familiar story: smaller exporters have repeatedly warned they are being left behind while larger firms surge ahead on the back of new trade agreements.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves said the event demonstrated that “Britain is open for business”, adding: “Our landmark trade deal with India is unlocking new opportunities in every corner of the country, from retail and consumer goods companies in the South West to whisky distilleries in Scotland. British small businesses sit at the heart of our growth mission, and backing them to export and grow is how we are building a more dynamic, more resilient economy.”

The entrepreneurs taking part — handpicked from sectors including food and drink, retail and consumer goods, will receive tailored training and coaching before pitching via livestream to an audience of Indian buyers. The gathering will also bring together senior representatives from the UK and Indian governments, trade bodies and leading corporates.

Michelle Ovens CBE, founder of Small Business Britain and adviser to the government’s Board of Trade, said the timing was right for ambitious firms to look east. “As one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, India offers significant potential for the UK’s 5.7 million small businesses looking to grow internationally,” she said. “As trade ties continue to strengthen, it’s more important than ever that we support UK entrepreneurs in exploring new markets, building valuable partnerships and expanding overseas.”

Trade policy minister Chris Bryant struck a similarly practical note: “Knowing an opportunity exists and seizing it are two different things, that’s exactly why the Great British Pitch India is about making sure our businesses have the platform to take advantage of our landmark deal. From cosmetics to whisky, the potential for UK small businesses is enormous and we will work tirelessly to help them succeed.”

The push comes amid warnings from MPs that the tariff gains promised by the UK-India deal could be put at risk by cuts to export support staff, making practical, buyer-facing initiatives of this kind all the more significant for smaller firms without the resources to navigate India’s administrative complexity alone.

India is only the first stop. Great British Pitch USA follows in September, before the flagship Great British Pitch event during International Trade Week connects small businesses with buyers, trade experts and investors in markets across the world.

For those who have already taken the plunge, the value is clear. Hepsie Goddin, co-founder of Sheffield and Devon-based gift and homeware business Martha and Hepsie, who took part in last year’s event, said: “Spending time with such wise and generous business minds and politicians reminded us just how powerful ambition can be, and that the world is full of opportunity if you’re brave enough to reach for it.”

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Small firms to pitch direct to Indian buyers as Great British Pitch returns with Downing Street backing

SpaceX shares surged on their stock market debut on Friday, racing past the $135 listing price to touch $150 as investors scrambled for a stake in Elon Musk’s vision of space, satellite and AI dominance.

The first-day pop, while shy of some of the more feverish predictions, caps the biggest flotation in stock market history and underlines the extraordinary appetite for a company that has come to embody the commercialisation of space. The offering was reportedly at least four times oversubscribed, leaving many would-be investors without an allocation and forcing them into the secondary market once trading began, a dynamic that helped propel the early gains. SpaceX had taken the unusual step of courting retail investors, setting aside a far larger slice of the offering for ordinary shareholders than is typical for a listing of this scale.

Musk did little to dampen the mood before the opening bell, promising that SpaceX would take people to the Moon, Mars and beyond.

“This is a rally being driven as much by hype and scarcity as fundamentals,” said Susannah Streeter, chief investment strategist at Wealth Club. “With just over 4 per cent of the company’s shares made available to public investors, demand far outstripped supply, helping fuel this sizeable first-day pop.”

The surge has come despite SpaceX already carrying an eye-watering $1.75 trillion valuation, a price tag that, as CNBC reported ahead of the listing, made the rocket maker more valuable than Tesla before a single share had changed hands. Friday’s gains raise the bar considerably, with an even bigger number now needing to be justified.

New investors are not so much buying today’s business as making a bet on how tomorrow’s world might evolve, a future built on reusable rockets, satellite connectivity and technologies that could transform how the world communicates, travels and lives. That faith persists despite the company revealing significant losses when it lifted the veil on its finances ahead of the float.

Central to the investment case is Starlink, now the company’s primary revenue engine. The satellite broadband network has passed 10 million active customers globally and is increasingly viewed as a global telecommunications platform rather than a niche connectivity service, one with growing relevance for British businesses, with Starlink poised to transform rural UK connectivity as the satellite race heats up.

Musk’s vision of mass space travel, his promise to take the fiction out of science fiction, has also stoked the excitement.

The challenge for SpaceX will be converting lofty expectations into consistent financial performance, and serious questions remain over whether the first-day gains can be sustained. Wall Street itself is divided: Fortune reported analysts split between hailing the listing as a “holy grail” and warning the valuation demands a leap of faith.

The real test will come in the months ahead as lock-up restrictions begin to expire and existing shareholders are free to sell. As more stock enters the market, the balance between supply and demand could shift markedly.

As so often during periods of market euphoria, the risks are taking a back seat. SpaceX’s ambitions are potentially transformative, but they are also highly capital-intensive and depend on technological breakthroughs, regulatory approvals and stable geopolitical conditions. One under-appreciated risk is the possibility of geopolitical tensions spilling into the space domain, with critical satellite infrastructure increasingly vulnerable to cyber-attacks, jamming or even direct anti-satellite military action.

For now, plenty of investors seem content to look past those concerns as they chase a stake in one of the world’s most closely watched companies, and join Musk on what they hope will be an historic rocket ride.

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SpaceX shares rocket past listing price in historic stock market debut

No business owner likes to think about worst-case scenarios. When you’re focused on growth, customer satisfaction, and day-to-day operations, it can be tempting to assume that serious disruptions are unlikely to happen.

However, crises can affect businesses of any size, often arriving with little warning and creating consequences that extend far beyond the immediate problem.

Whether it’s a cyberattack, legal dispute, reputational issue, regulatory investigation, or operational disruption, a business crisis can be expensive, time-consuming, and damaging. While many organisations focus on the direct costs associated with a crisis, the hidden costs are often far greater and can have a lasting impact on the future of the business.

Understanding these risks is the first step towards building a more resilient organisation.

The Financial Impact Goes Beyond Immediate Losses

When a crisis occurs, the most obvious concern is usually the immediate financial cost. This may include repairing damaged property, replacing stolen equipment, paying legal fees, or recovering from a cyber incident.

However, these visible expenses are often only part of the picture.

Businesses frequently face additional costs such as lost productivity, reduced sales, cancelled contracts, overtime expenses, and the resources required to manage the situation. In some cases, the financial consequences continue long after the initial event has been resolved.

For smaller businesses and startups with limited cash reserves, even a relatively minor crisis can place significant strain on finances.

Damage to Reputation Can Be Difficult to Reverse

A company’s reputation is one of its most valuable assets. Unfortunately, it can also be one of the most vulnerable during a crisis.

Negative publicity, customer complaints, regulatory issues, or service failures can quickly spread through social media, review platforms, and industry networks. Once trust has been damaged, rebuilding it can take considerable time and effort.

Customers are increasingly selective about who they do business with, and a damaged reputation can influence purchasing decisions long after the original incident has passed.

Businesses that invest in crisis planning are often better positioned to respond quickly, communicate effectively, and minimise reputational fallout.

Operational Disruption Creates Hidden Costs

Many business owners underestimate the impact of downtime.

A disruption that prevents employees from working efficiently or stops normal operations altogether can quickly affect revenue generation. Delayed projects, missed deadlines, supply chain interruptions, and customer service issues can all result from a crisis.

Even if the disruption lasts only a few days, the knock-on effects may continue for weeks or months.

Business continuity planning helps organisations identify critical functions and develop strategies to maintain operations when unexpected challenges arise.

Legal and Regulatory Issues Can Escalate Quickly

A crisis can often trigger legal or regulatory complications.

Data breaches may lead to investigations and compliance concerns. Workplace incidents could result in employee claims. Customer disputes may evolve into formal legal proceedings. In regulated professions, complaints can sometimes lead to professional investigations.

The costs associated with these situations are not limited to compensation payments or fines. Businesses may also face significant legal expenses, management time, and administrative burdens.

Professional service providers and healthcare professionals often understand these risks particularly well. For example, clinicians frequently rely on specialist protection such as dental indemnity insurance to help manage the financial and legal consequences of complaints, negligence allegations, and regulatory investigations.

The lesson applies across all sectors: being prepared before a problem occurs is often far less costly than responding after the fact.

Employee Morale Often Suffers

The impact of a crisis is not limited to finances and operations. Employees can also feel the effects.

Periods of uncertainty can create stress, reduce productivity, and affect morale. Staff may become concerned about job security, increased workloads, or the future direction of the business.

If communication is poor, rumours and uncertainty can make the situation worse.

Organisations that have clear crisis management procedures in place are typically better equipped to support employees and maintain confidence during challenging periods.

Lost Opportunities Are Easy to Overlook

One of the most significant hidden costs of a crisis is the opportunities a business misses while dealing with the problem.

Management teams may need to divert attention away from growth initiatives, product development, recruitment, or customer acquisition efforts. Valuable time and resources become focused on damage control rather than strategic progress.

Competitors may seize opportunities to attract customers, enter new markets, or strengthen their position while affected businesses are focused elsewhere.

Although these losses may not appear on a balance sheet, they can have a meaningful impact on long-term growth.

Cyber Threats Present a Growing Challenge

As businesses become increasingly dependent on digital systems, cyber risks continue to rise.

A successful cyberattack can lead to operational disruption, financial losses, regulatory scrutiny, and reputational damage. Recovering from such incidents often requires specialist expertise and can be both costly and time-consuming.

Despite these risks, many smaller businesses still underestimate their vulnerability.

Implementing cybersecurity measures, employee training, data backup procedures, and incident response plans can significantly reduce exposure to cyber-related crises.

The Value of Preparation

While it is impossible to eliminate every risk, preparation can dramatically improve a business’s ability to respond when challenges arise.

Effective crisis planning may include:

• Identifying key business risks
• Developing a business continuity plan
• Establishing communication procedures
• Reviewing insurance arrangements
• Providing employee training
• Creating incident response protocols
• Regularly testing contingency plans

Preparation allows businesses to react more quickly, reduce disruption, and minimise the overall impact of unexpected events.

Building a More Resilient Business

Crises are an unfortunate reality of modern business, but the organisations that recover most effectively are often those that planned ahead. The true cost of being unprepared extends far beyond immediate financial losses and can affect reputation, employee wellbeing, customer relationships, and future growth opportunities.

By taking a proactive approach to risk management and resilience, business owners can strengthen their ability to navigate uncertainty and protect what they have worked so hard to build. In an increasingly unpredictable business environment, preparation is not simply a precaution—it is a competitive advantage.

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The Hidden Costs of Being Unprepared for a Business Crisis

When I wrote that the cancellation of Stephen Colbert was the canary in the coal mine of American broadcasting, a number of readers wrote in to suggest I was over-egging the pudding.

It was just money, they said. Ratings. The brutal economics of late-night television. Well. To those readers I say, with all the grace I can muster: the canary is now dead, the miners are coughing, and CBS has just sacked the man who came down the shaft to check.

Scott Pelley, 37 years at CBS, a man who has been shot at in Iraq and Afghanistan, who reported from Ground Zero while the dust was still in the air, was fired from 60 Minutes this month in a meeting that lasted ten minutes. Ten minutes. I’ve waited longer for a flat white in Shoreditch.

The details, laid bare in his extraordinary interview with Lulu Garcia-Navarro at The New York Times, read like a corporate horror story. First came what staff now call Black Thursday: Bari Weiss, parachuted in as editor-in-chief after Paramount’s Skydance takeover, sacked Tanya Simon, the first woman ever to run 60 Minutes, fresh from growing its audience nine per cent, a feat in broadcast telly roughly equivalent to teaching a cat to fetch. In her place: Nick Bilton, a former tech columnist with no broadcast experience whatsoever, who introduced himself to a newsroom of war correspondents with an email explaining that it wasn’t 1968 anymore and that petrol no longer costs 32 cents. The man then addressed fifty heartbroken journalists by reading a statement off his phone, next to a consolation spread of bagels. Bagels. As though grief were a catering problem.

But here is the part that should chill every reader of this column, whatever their politics. Pelley alleges that after a 60 Minutes piece on the deaths of two civilians during the ICE crackdown in Minneapolis had been approved by everyone, an email arrived from Weiss asking, in effect, whether the protesters could be made to look more violent, and whether a dead woman’s car could be described as driving towards the officer, which, Pelley says, is not what the video shows. “A thumb on the scale for the president’s version of events,” he called it. A level of political influence he had never seen in 37 years.

He wept in the interview. He knew exactly what would happen next, “Fox News is going to just run the parts where I’m crying and say I’m a lunatic”, and said the whole thing felt like your spouse being murdered. CBS denies political motivation, naturally. Companies always do. CBS also told us Colbert’s cancellation was “purely financial”, three days after he mocked their $16 million settlement with the president on air. At some point coincidence stops being coincidence and becomes a business model.

I keep thinking about the night I saw George Clooney’s Broadway revival of Good Night, and Good Luck, I wrote then about the slow death of the fourth estate, and how Edward R. Murrow’s stand against McCarthy felt less like history and more like prophecy. Murrow built CBS News. He warned us, in his famous 1958 “wires and lights in a box” speech, that television without conscience was merely furniture. Sixty-eight years on, his own network is proving him right with a thoroughness that borders on parody. The house Murrow built is being sold off room by room, and the new owners are ripping out the load-bearing walls because they clash with the curtains.

Why should a British business audience care? Because this is, at bottom, a business story. Paramount didn’t fold because of ideology; it folded because a merger needed regulatory approval and the regulator answered to a man with a grudge. That is the lesson for every boardroom: once you pay the danegeld, the Dane doesn’t leave. He moves in, criticises your bagels, and starts editing your scripts. Trust, whether in a brand, a balance sheet or a broadcaster, takes decades to earn and one craven settlement to squander, and CBS has just written the case study.

And the talent? It will do what talent always does when the institutions fail it, walk. Colbert will be fine. Pelley will be fine. As Piers Morgan demonstrated when he took Uncensored to YouTube, the audience now follows the journalist, not the network. The institutions, though, the newsrooms that sent pregnant correspondents into war zones because the story mattered, those take generations to build and one corporate funk to destroy.

Murrow ended his broadcasts with “good night, and good luck”. Watching CBS dismantle itself to please a president, I’d say the night has well and truly arrived. As for the luck, they’ll need it.

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Scott Pelley fired from 60 Minutes: the next domino in the fall of American journalism

Frasers Group has launched a £1.7 billion takeover bid for Hugo Boss, offering cash for the 74 per cent of the German fashion house it does not already own in the boldest move yet in Mike Ashley’s long march upmarket.

The FTSE-listed retail group, which counts Sports Direct and GAME among its stable of brands, is offering €38 per share for the premium menswear and womenswear label, whose name has become a fixture in UK business pages in recent years. Under German takeover law, once Frasers crosses the 30 per cent threshold of Hugo Boss’s share capital and voting rights, it is obliged to make a mandatory offer for every share it does not hold.

Subject to regulatory clearances, Frasers expects the offer to complete in the second half of 2026.

The bid is the logical conclusion of a strategy Frasers has pursued for years: building stakes in brands it believes are undervalued, then tightening its grip. The group recently built a 6 per cent holding in Puma as it targeted a turnaround at the struggling sportswear maker, and has long described Hugo Boss as one of the top five brands across its entire business.

Frasers, where Mike Ashley stepped back from day-to-day leadership in 2022, was at pains to stress continuity. The group said it remains a long-term investor in Hugo Boss and continues to support both Stephan Sturm, chair of the supervisory board, and chief executive Daniel Grieder. Frasers chief executive Michael Murray, who sits on the Hugo Boss supervisory board, recused himself from the board’s discussion of the offer.

The deal’s financing is already in place. Frasers has entered into an acquisition facility agreement with lenders including BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank Luxembourg, NatWest and Standard Chartered, giving it a credit line for the offer and associated costs if required. The group may also draw on its existing term loan and revolving credit facility.

The prize is considerable. Hugo Boss reported revenues of almost €4.3 billion in 2025 and EBITDA of €782 million, with gross assets of €3.7 billion and net assets of almost €1.6 billion. Yet the German group’s shares have been trading at around half their value of three years ago, after a prolonged slump in luxury spending, a discount Ashley’s dealmakers have clearly decided is too tempting to ignore.

If the offer succeeds, it would rank among the largest acquisitions in Frasers’ history, transforming a group built on discount sportswear into the owner of one of Europe’s best-known premium fashion houses.

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Frasers Group launches £1.7bn bid to take full control of Hugo Boss

Rachel Reeves has signalled that taxes may have to rise again to fund Britain’s rearmament, as the government’s long-delayed defence funding blueprint slipped further down the timetable and pressure mounted from the opposition to find the money through welfare savings instead.

The Chancellor, who has already been warned she may need to find as much as £50bn through tax rises or spending cuts to stabilise the public finances, told a City audience that her Budget headroom would not stretch to cover the additional defence commitment, expected to be worth around £15bn, bargained down by the Treasury from an initial £18bn.

“The first duty of government is to keep its people safe,” she said. “In the world in which we live today it’s increasingly clear that us and other European countries are going to have to spend more on defence but crucially spend that money better. But the money has to come from somewhere and borrowing cannot always be the answer.”

Defending her record, Reeves argued that “despite the pain of higher taxes” it was better to hold the line on the public finances than risk climbing interest rates and a rising UK risk premium. Her fiscal statements have raised an extra £75bn a year in under two years, comfortably ahead of Gordon Brown’s £62.1bn and enough to make her the biggest tax-raising Chancellor in six decades. The Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts the tax burden will hit 38.5 per cent of GDP by 2030-31, the highest since records began, and has warned that the freeze on earnings thresholds leaves revenues acutely sensitive to shifts in inflation and pay growth.

At a bad-tempered Prime Minister’s Questions, Sir Keir Starmer appeared to pour cold water on hopes that the Defence Investment Plan (DIP), the funding document intended to turn last year’s Strategic Defence Review into costed programmes, would be published this week, committing only to releasing it before the NATO summit on 7 July.

Pressed by Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch on whether the full plan would “finally” appear this week, the Prime Minister pointed to the increase in defence spending from 2.3 per cent to 2.6 per cent of GDP by 2027, worth £270bn over the Parliament. “That sounded like a ‘no’,” Badenoch shot back.

The slippage matters for business. Departments are understood to have been asked to surrender an average of 1 per cent of their capital budgets to raise £6bn towards the plan, a raid that could hit school and hospital programmes and delay transport infrastructure. Yet for the defence supply chain the prize is considerable: analysis suggests higher military spending could deliver a £30bn annual boost to the UK economy, with around two thirds of MoD private-sector spending flowing to UK-based suppliers.

The government’s room for manoeuvre remains constrained after last year’s backbench revolt killed off efforts to curb sickness benefits, leaving ministers squeezed between a welfare bill heading towards £333bn and a tax burden already at a post-war peak. Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden is reported to have privately complained that Labour MPs only cared about who they could “tax in order to pay benefits to others”.

Touring broadcast studios, Labour Party chair Anna Turley declined to deny that taxes would have to rise again, saying only that there were “very difficult decisions to be made across the board in every department” and that the Chancellor was “having those conversations right now”.

For SME owners, the signals are hard to misread. With the OBR warning the Exchequer is increasingly reliant on a narrow base of better-off taxpayers, and a leadership “bidding war” seeing rivals float wealth taxes, land value taxes and council tax revaluation, the question facing business is less whether the burden rises again, but where it lands.

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Reeves signals further tax rises as defence spending plan slips again