Profits soar at Schering October 25, 2005 German drug company Schering has seen its quarterly profits soar by 29 per cent thanks to a cost-cutting programme and better than expected sales of its new birth control pill Yasmin. The company has increased its end of year profit forecast; shares rose by nearly 3 per cent on the news in pre-market trading. Profit [...]
Why women really mean business October 24, 2005 So, Robbie Williams thinks that experiencing the female orgasm will give him a better understanding of what it’s like to be a woman. Oh, if only it were that simple. To begin to understand what makes a woman tick, he’d be well-advised to get inside our heads first. And if, like us, you’re a woman [...]
The art of business October 24, 2005 With corporate curators taking more risks in their purchasing policy, staff around the City are being exposed to more cutting edge art than ever before. An excitable group of schoolboys snakes along one of the corridors of Deutsche Bank’s Winchester House offices in the heart of the City. They bob around a lithograph of a [...]
Crash Course? October 24, 2005 On the anniversary of the 1929 stock market collapse, Laurie Laird asks if we are in danger of repeating that disaster. What year is it? It’s October, and the autumn fashion shows have featured falling hemlines and rising waistbands — the wasp waist is back. On the economics front, the world’s biggest economy has been [...]
Max Petroleum set for AIM flotation October 24, 2005 Max Petroleum is to become the eighth largest AIM quote this year in the ever-growing oil and gas sector when it floats on Wednesday. The company is raising £26m and expects to reach a market capitalisation of £90m. It is also due to list in Frankfurt on the same day. The group specialises in oil [...]
Not switching off costs £123m a year October 24, 2005 Those who forget to switch off their computers at night should probably think twice. The simple action of pressing the off button could save British industry £123.2m every year. Research by Fujitsu Siemens Computers shows that 78 per cent of employees claim to be more environmentally friendly today than they were five years ago, yet [...]
London is too taxed October 24, 2005 The government is imposing an onerous and discriminatory system on taxpayers in London, according to a recent survey. The survey by Williams de Broe into regional disparities in the cost of living has found that the starting point for income tax in London should be £1,550 higher than in the country’s poorest region, Northern Ireland, [...]
Whitbread wields axe as speculators circle October 24, 2005 Whitbread is expected to reveal plans to axe a quarter of its head office work force tomorrow. As he reports disappointing interim figures on Tuesday, chief executive Alan Parker is expected to confirm that up to 250 jobs will go at the leisure group’s Luton headquarters. Parker is fighting to keep the disparate business together. [...]
House prices slip again October 24, 2005 House prices have fallen for the 16th consecutive month according to the Hometrack October survey. This pours cold water on recent claims that the market is picking up. Hometrack says that the average house price has fallen by 3.5 per cent to £160,000 over the past 12 months from a peak of £167,000 in June [...]
Ericsson takes on Alcatel in battle for Marconi October 24, 2005 Swedish telecoms equipment giant Ericsson and France’s Alcatel are neck and neck in the final stage of a contest to buy Marconi, according to sources close to both companies. Final bids for Marconi are due tomorrow morning and a winner could be announced as early as the afternoon. Britain’s last remaining telecoms equipment maker has [...]