Business

The UK will benefit from almost £20bn of extra private investment from Japan, Downing Street has said, as Rishi Sunak visits the nation for the G7 summit. The prime minister will personally thank a Japanese minister for the country’s support of the UK joining the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Earlier this

The troubled online estate agent Purplebricks has revealed a sale of the business to rival Strike, for the token sum of just £1. Purplebricks Group, which put itself up for sale in February after a series of profit warnings, said it had entered a conditional agreement to transfer its business to Strike that would include

Ian King’s speaking to Andrew Opie at the British Retail Consortium about today’s summit looking at food inflation and supply issues. Chris Gray, Director at ManpowerGroup UK, reacts to rising unemployment figures, Jaeger Glucina, the managing director of AI company Luminance, talks about law-focused Artificial Intelligence; and there’s analysis of the headlines from The Times’

WhatsApp users will soon be able to lock and hide conversations, thanks to a new feature. Chat Lock will remove a chat thread from the app’s regular onscreen inbox and place it into a new folder that can only be opened by a password or biometric, such as facial recognition or a fingerprint. Calling it

For all its seaside delights, Margate in Kent is one of the most deprived parts of the UK. Amid the cost of living crisis, many families are struggling to make ends meet. Falling ill can become a headlong plunge into poverty – as Kyra Lloyd, a 25-year-old shop assistant, discovered when she began experiencing agonising

The governor of the Bank of England has told Sky News he expects inflation to fall “rapidly” in just weeks – but warned two thirds of the pain from interest rate rises is yet to come. Andrew Bailey made the comments after interest rates were increased for a record-breaking 12th successive time, lifting the cost

Google has announced its first folding smartphone, with a market-leading starting price of £1,749. That puts the Pixel Fold well ahead of the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4, the world’s most expensive foldable handset, which comes in at £1,649. Like its competitor, Google‘s effort has a familiar smartphone form factor when closed but opens up into

Prices have increased at the world’s largest holiday company and are now “notably higher” than just three months ago. The average selling price at Tui has increased 5%, which the company has described as “notably higher” than the 2% price increase reported in the first three months of its 2023 financial year. In its half-year

JD Sports Fashion will complete the overhaul of its top executive team this week when it raids the owner of the Comparethemarket price comparison site to appoint its new finance chief. Sky News has learnt that the London-listed retailer has finalised the appointment of Dominic Platt, who is currently chief financial officer at privately held

One of the co-founders of Funding Circle, the London-listed fintech, is taking the helm of a solar energy start-up which promises to bring down the cost of renewable power for households and small businesses. Sky News understands that Rainbow Energy, which was founded in 2020, will announce this week that it has recruited Andrew Mullinger

BP is exploring a sale of two of the companies owned by its early-stage ventures arm in a move which could raise tens of millions of pounds. Sky News has learnt that the FTSE 100 company’s Launchpad division has begun contacting prospective buyers of Lytt and Onyx Insight in recent weeks. Lytt transforms large amounts

A defence-focused British artificial intelligence software company chaired by a veteran of City boardrooms has raised a substantial round of funding to fuel its expansion. Sky News has learnt that Adarga, which helps the Ministry of Defence and national security-focused clients identify threats more effectively by sifting vast amounts of information, has secured £17m from

Shakespeare and the Spice Girls were used by environmental protestors to repeatedly disrupt the Barclays annual general meeting (AGM) in central London on Wednesday morning. Activists from Extinction Rebellion, Fossil Free London and Climate Choir were protesting the UK high street bank’s investment in new fossil fuel projects despite heavy security at the AGM venue.

Elon Musk is wrong to call for a global pause in the development of AI, which would play into the hands of rogue regimes, a new report has warned. The SpaceX, Tesla, and Twitter owner was one of 1,000 people to put his name to a letter saying humanity faced “profound risks” due to the

The UK financial watchdog will announce plans to change the rules on bringing companies into public ownership after a series of high profile businesses snubbed the London Stock Exchange. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) will on Wednesday publish proposed changes to rules on listing companies on the London Stock Exchange. It hopes to make regulation

The new owners of Chelsea FC are in talks with Allianz, the German insurance giant, about taking over as its principal shirt sponsor as they grapple with the impact of a dire debut season on the club’s finances. Sky News has learnt that Allianz is among a handful of companies in discussions with the Stamford

The conflict in Sudan has left international consumer goods makers racing to shore up supplies of gum arabic – critical to the food, drinks and cosmetics industry. The northeastern African country is the world’s largest producer of gum arabic, a resin tapped from the acacia tree. It is a key ingredient in everything from fizzy

Elon Musk has been ordered to be interviewed under oath to determine if he made specific statements about Tesla’s Autopilot feature after the carmaker threw their authenticity into doubt, saying the billionaire was often a target of online “deepfakes”. A judge in California made the tentative ruling after raising concerns that such arguments could be

The British competition watchdog has blocked Microsoft’s bid to buy video game maker Activision Blizzard. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) stopped the $68.7bn (£55bn) deal due to concerns that it would stifle competition in the cloud gaming market. In its final report on Wednesday, the CMA said that the move was “the only effective

Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar talks to Ian King about grocery prices and developing trends in our shopping habits. Plus, chief executive and co-founder of GAIL’s Bakery, Tom Molnar, discusses how the rising price of flour has affected his business. Ian’s also joined by the boss of train ticketing app