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1 week ago | 
spearswms.com | Rupert Neate
Behind a pair of white gates in Weybridge, Surrey, there are 429 houses that are home to so many of the UK's - and the world's - rich and famous people that the estate has been dubbed 'Britain's Beverly Hills'. Welcome to St George's Hill, a 964-acre private estate created in 1911 as an idealised country retreat for London professionals that has now become so expensive that few of today's bankers, accountants and lawyers could afford the average £6.9 million price tag.
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1 month ago | 
aol.co.uk | Rupert Neate
Companies did all they could to encourage their workers back to the office after the pandemic. There were free meals, unlimited snacks, pilates classes, social events, subsidised travel costs, and some offices even installed doggy daycare facilities for workers who got four-legged companions during lockdown.
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2 months ago | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
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2 months ago | 
aol.co.uk | Rupert Neate
The vowels are back. British asset management firm Abrdn (ABDN.L) announced this week that it is reinstating the Es in its name four years after it removed them in a rebranding exercise dubbed an “act of corporate insanity”. It is the latest in a series of well-known companies that changed their historic names only to U-turn and reinstate the original name following outrage and derision from customers and the media.
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Feb 14, 2025 | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
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Dec 6, 2024 | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
“Vodafone must change,” Margherita Della Valle declared when she took over as chief executive of the FTSE 100 telecoms company in April 2023. After working at Vodafone for 30 years, including as chief financial officer between 2018 and 2023, Della Valle told her 104,000 employees that “our performance has not been good enough” — and that 11,000 of them would be losing their jobs as a result.
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Nov 29, 2024 | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
Allan Leighton returned to Asda’s headquarters in Leeds this week as its newly appointed executive chairman with a mission to “restore Asda’s DNA” 24 years after he last left the building as chief executive. Leighton’s surprise reappointment to lead the retail chain, which is struggling against fierce competition from discount retailers as well as a mountain of debt and an IT nightmare, means he is the latest to join a growing trend of so-called “boomerang CEOs”.
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Nov 3, 2024 | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
Becoming chief executive of BT was not Allison Kirkby’s first dream job. That was to become chief financial officer of Manchester United, which she nearly realised in 2014. A decade after that slight setback she is excelling on a much larger stage than the “theatre of dreams” at Old Trafford. BT’s share price, which trailed the market for years, has jumped by 27 per cent since she joined the company on February 1, valuing it at £13.8 billion. Manchester United is worth £2.1 billion.
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Oct 11, 2024 | 
thetimes.com | Rupert Neate
After surfing a luxury boom during the pandemic lockdowns, LVMH — which owns Louis Vuitton, Bulgari, Dior and Moët & Chandon champagne among a collection of 75 high-end brands or “maisons” — is expected to report a further deterioration of sales in its key Chinese market when it reports third-quarter earnings on Monday.
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Aug 20, 2024 | 
theguardian.com | Rupert Neate
Good morning. The oceans are – according to the UN – “the world’s greatest ally against climate change”. While many of us now understand the urgent need to take the climate crisis seriously, the focus is still very much on the land and the air. Oceans cover more than 70% of the surface of the planet, generate 50% of the oxygen we breathe, absorb 25% of all carbon dioxide emissions and capture 90% of the excess heat generated by these emissions.
