Business News

Works to improve Birmingham City Council’s CCTV network around the city centre – which would see 24 new cameras installed and 30 existing cameras upgraded are due to begin this month (March 2022).

The expansion follows Cabinet’s approval for the proposals on 14 December to help plug gaps in CCTV coverage and improve the quality and reliability of city centre network, as well as help residents, visitors and workers in the area feel safer.

Westley Group, one of Europe’s largest privately-owned foundry and engineering groups, is set to further invest in new CNC machinery following an eight-figure funding package from HSBC UK. The funding from HSBC UK will support the Group’s UK business plans to add further value to its foundry activities through machining more of the castings it produces for its worldwide customer base.

The University of Wolverhampton’s Business School has secured an award-winning female entrepreneur to speak at a business networking event on International Women’s Day.

Great British Entrepreneur award winner, Fungai Ndemera, will be guest speaker at the free networking event which takes place on Tuesday 8 March from 12.00 midday until 2.00 pm in the University of Wolverhampton Business School, Deanery Row in Wolverhampton. The event has been sponsored by FBC Manby Bowdler Solicitors LLP.

Kaiser is officially open for business online after launching its website in January 2022. The site offers more than 100 built-in and freestanding appliances from its award-winning range. Consumers across the UK get to shop products from this entire Kaiser range plus enjoy amazing perks such as free delivery and installation.

Social enterprises from across Birmingham are being urged to tap into £16.3m of funding that will help their communities recover from the impact of Covid-19.

The Social Enterprise Support Fund (SESF) reopens for applications at 1pm on Monday February 28th, with organisations in the City able to apply for grants of between £10,000 and £100,000 to help them deliver essential services or increase trading in the communities they serve.

National law firm Clarke Willmott LLP has acted on a deal between household cleaning giant HG and a family-run eco-friendly cleaning product manufacturer.  

Netherlands brand HG acquired UK-based Ecozone for an undisclosed sum in a deal led by Clarke Willmott corporate partner Richard Swain, who acted for the selling shareholder Simeon Van der Molen. 

It’s official, Liverpool and Salford are leading the way on levelling up when it comes to the post-Covid property market.

Demand for flats has bounced back so hard that their annual gains have now started to eclipse those of the wider market, having surged as the UK emerges from the pandemic, analysis by property experts James Pendleton reveals.

XPO Logistics, Inc., a leading provider of freight transportation services, has been awarded Carrier Partner of the Year for its less-than-truckload (LTL) performance by GlobalTranz Enterprises, LLC. This is the second year that XPO’s North American LTL business has been honored by GlobalTranz, a technology-driven, third-party logistics provider with extensive industry relationships.

Businesses could be at a heightened risk of cyber attacks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – an expert from cyber security firm CSS Assure has warned.

Ukrainian banking and government websites were knocked offline last week by a spate of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, which are designed to crash sites by bombarding them with excessive requests at the same, causing server overloads and shutdowns.

Rackspace Technology, a leading end-to-end, multicloud technology solutions company is extending its Strategic Collaboration Agreement (SCA) with Amazon Web Services (AWS) with an additional multi-year joint investment to drive customer value and innovation. The expanded agreement comes after Rackspace Technology’s AWS business has grown by 250% over the past 3 years and was named 2021 AWS Migration Partner of the Year (US & Canada). 

Specially trained sniffer dogs are now being used to track down metal thieves who cause major delays to passengers and freight on the Chiltern main line and key West Midlands rail routes. Network Rail has enlisted the canine recruits, provided by Search Dogs UK, to crack down on criminals who steal vital cables and materials from the railway and catch those who illegally sell those items on.

WV Living has appointed a contractor to develop new homes at its newest site in the City of Wolverhampton.

GreenSquareAccord has been selected as a partner to build 178 homes, including 29 affordable rent and 16 shared ownership homes on the site of the former Northicote School, Northwood Park Road, Bushbury.

The Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment is pleased to announce the appointment of David Madgwick ACSI as President of CISI’s Essex branch.

David has 20 years of experience in financial services, starting as a business development manager in Lloyds Private Banking and pursuing an early career as a Financial Adviser for Santander Bank.

EML Payments powers CoinJar's new CoinJar Card with Mastercard. The fully-featured debit card allows customers to make purchases by instantly converting cryptocurrencies into fiat currency, everywhere Mastercard is accepted. CoinJar partnered with EML to provide customers with seamless and lightning-fast transactions, no matter where in the world CoinJar Card is used.

Unmarried couples do not share the same legal rights as those who are wedlocked – yet 2 in 3 people who are looking to buy a house aren’t aware of the rules, new research by Birmingham law firm Shakespeare Martineau has revealed. Nearly half (47%) of those surveyed incorrectly believe a common law spouse exists, with a further 20% unsure of the difference in rights – meaning 67% of homeowners are at risk of losing out on what is rightfully theirs through a lack of knowledge.

New research has revealed the UK local authorities that are increasing their construction funding at the fastest rate, with some councils upping their spend by more than 5,000% over five years. IronmongeryDirect issued Freedom of Information requests to each local authority and asked how much they spent on construction projects, including buildings, roads and railways, in the 2015/16 and 2020/21 financial years, to see how investment has changed over time.