Month: October 2023

JD Wetherspoon has credited a surge in sales and reduction in costs for its first annual profit since the COVID pandemic.
The value pub and hotel chain, which trades from 826 sites across the UK and Ireland, reported profit before tax for the year to the end of July of £42.6m.
That compared to a loss of just over £30m during the previous 12 months.
Like-for-like sales rose by 12.7% and total sales by 10.6% to £1.92bn. Food sales were a major factor behind the revenue rise while bar sales were up 9%.
Wetherspoons said that momentum had continued since the end of the financial year with sales, on a comparable basis, up by just shy of 10% over the nine weeks to 1 October.
Its value offering has proved attractive as budgets continue to be squeezed by the effects of the cost of living crisis.
The pub, and wider hospitality sector, has had a particularly tough time since March 2020 when COVID restrictions forced sites into temporary hibernation for weeks at a time on several occasions.
Surging ingredient and energy costs, enforced wage increases and staff shortages have been among the challenges facing the industry since – with the effects of higher prices forcing pubs in England and Wales out of business.
A total of 13,000 were lost during 2020 and 2021, with a further 450 going last year according to British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA) data.
Recent figures from commercial real estate specialists Altus Group showed closures in England and Wales were running at a rate of two per day.
The BBPA has called for an extension of business rates relief, beyond the current financial year, to prevent further permanent closures.
The Wetherspoons model has provided it with protection but it told investors there would be no final dividend payment.
Shares rose by almost 2%.
Charlie Huggins, portfolio manager at Wealth Club, said of the performance: “Wetherspoons seems to be moving in the right direction, following a very difficult few years.
“The rise in energy and food costs over the last 18 months has posed major headaches for Wetherspoons and put pressure on margins. However, inflation now appears to be moderating which should bode well for profits in 2024.
“Despite these rising costs, Wetherspoons has been committed to maintaining low prices. This is helping to keep customers loyal, as shown by the robust like-for-like sales growth.
“These value credentials are critical, and should mean the group is better placed than many of its peers to weather any downturn in consumer spending.”
Read more:
Wetherspoons toasts first annual profits since pandemic

British Airways is on the brink of a long-term pay deal with its pilots, aimed at removing the renewed threat of strike action until at least 2027.
It is understood that BA, a subsidiary of the FTSE 100 company International Airlines Group, was applying the finishing touches to an agreement with BALPA, the airline pilots’ union, on Thursday morning.
The three-and-a-half-year deal, which has been the subject of months of negotiation, expected to secure the agreement of BALPA, which would then ballot its members on the proposal.
One source said they expected the deal to be communicated within the coming days.
Under the agreement, BA pilots will receive a 4% pay rise this year, backdated to June, followed by further uplifts of 1.5% in December, 2.5% next June, and a further 2% six months later.
That will then be followed by a 0.5% rise in March 2025, 2.5% in June of that year and another 2.5% in June 2026.
Pilots will also receive a one-off payment of £1,000 this November, according to a source close to the talks.
They will also participate in a new reward scheme based on BA’s operating profit performance, which could trigger bonuses worth thousands of pounds.
The next pilot pay review will take place in January 2027.
The BALPA agreement comes weeks after unions representing about 24,000 other BA staff secured a 13% pay increase spread over 18 months.
A BA spokesperson said: “We are pleased that we have now reached an agreement in principle for the pilot pay award 2023-27.
“BALPA will now ballot its members on the agreement in principle.
“The pay offer builds on a number of pay and reward changes made in 2022 to support colleagues throughout the business at a time of ongoing cost of living pressures.”
Read more:
BA pilots on brink of three-year pay deal to avert threat of strike

UK oil and gas companies need to do more if they are to meet an official target of halving their emissions from fossil fuel extraction by the end of the decade, the North Sea regulator has warned.
The North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) said it would set out proposals to help give fossil fuel companies a greater focus on their climate pledges amid concerns the targets would be missed without further action.
The firms promised to slash the emissions caused during the production of oil and gas as part of a deal struck with government in 2021 to secure billions of pounds in state help for the sector.
This year the government granted more than 100 new North Sea exploration licences and gave the green light to develop the huge Rosebank oilfield.
The NSTA warning is the latest to cast doubt on the UK meeting its legally binding climate targets given government announcements of plans to delay the ban on combustion engines in new vehicles and the phaseout of gas boilers, and to water down home energy efficiency standards.
The watchdog’s proposals will form part of an industry consultation to “encourage oil and gas operators to take action today”. The industry is under pressure to reduce emissions from oil and gas production, which accounts for about 3% of total UK greenhouse gas emissions.
Last month, a NSTA report found the industry was on track to meet the interim emission reduction targets of 10% by 2025, and 25% by 2027, compared with 2018, but added that “bold measures” would be required to halve emissions by 2030.
“Significant progress has been made, but there is more work to be done and the NSTA estimates that without further initiatives, the 2030 emissions reduction target agreed between government and industry as part of the North Sea transition deal may be missed,” the regulator said this week.
The government’s transition deal earmarked more than £8bn in public funds to support the industry as it prepared to play a role in the UK’s ambition to develop carbon capture technology and hydrogen production. In exchange, the industry promised to cut its emissions and use UK-made components for 50% of their decarbonisation projects.
The NSTA said the industry risked losing its “ongoing social licence to operate”, which allowed companies to keep drilling for oil and gas even while the UK moved away from fossil fuels, unless it could meet its longer term climate targets.
Philip Evans, a climate campaigner for Greenpeace UK, said the industry’s operational emissions were “the mere tip of the iceberg” compared with those produced by using fossil fuels, which accounted for more than 80% of the total emissions from drilling, extracting and burning oil and gas.
“This is why [Rishi] Sunak’s plan to ‘max out’ North Sea reserves is a grave mistake,” Evans said.
“The government’s deliberate disregard for the majority of the emissions from these climate-wrecking projects is completely reckless and the reason we’re fighting them in two separate court cases.
“And, unless it revokes the recently approved licence for Rosebank, we’re likely to be back for a third.”
A government spokesperson said: “Through our landmark North Sea transition deal agreed between the UK government and industry, we are backing the decarbonisation of the oil and gas sector while supporting tens of thousands of jobs across Scotland and the wider UK.
“While our plans to power up Britain include significant investment in new renewable and nuclear projects, the transition to non-fossil forms of energy cannot happen overnight and, even when we’re net zero, we will still need some oil and gas, as recognised by the independent Climate Change Committee.”
Read more:
UK oil and gas sector ‘must it must do more’ to meet 2030 emissions target

The District Court of Amsterdam has today ruled that Uber has failed to comply with the April 2023 Court of Appeal order that Uber must provide transparency into the automated decision to dismiss two drivers from the UK and Portugal.
The case was brought by Worker Info Exchange (WIE) in support of the App Drivers & Couriers Union (ADCU).
In April 2023 the Amsterdam Court of Appeal found that the drivers are entitled to information about the existence of automated decision making used in the management decision to dismiss them. This includes profiling of the workers and meaningful information about the logic involved, as well as the significance and the envisaged consequences of such automated decision making.
The Court of Appeal ruled that Uber is obliged to provide this information so that workers can reasonably challenge the robo-firing decisions. In particular, information on factors taken into account in the decision-making process, and their respective weighting at an aggregate level, should be provided. Uber was ordered to provide sufficient information for the workers to understand the reasons for the employment dismissal decision taken against them.
The Court of Appeal also found that the human review of the robo-firing decisions was nothing more than a symbolic act.
Today’s ruling that Uber has failed to comply with the Court of Appeal order.
The District Court of Amsterdam today found that Uber has failed to comply with the order of the Court of Appeal in the case of two drivers. The court ordered that Uber has forfeited uncapped penalty payments of €4,000 per day which now stands at a total of €584,000 due to the drivers until Uber complies with the Court of Appeal order for algorithmic transparency.
In responding to the Court of Appeal order, Uber provided only further information about the post decision human review which the Court of Appeal had already dismissed as ‘nothing more than a symbolic act’. Uber failed to provide any meaningful information about the profiling used, the factors used in the decision making and the logic used in the algorithmic decision to fire the drivers. Uber continued to argue that it should not give the workers more information about the decision to dismiss them so that the firm could protect its security and trade secrets.
The Judge determined that Uber failed to provide any information about the solely automated part of the decision to dismiss the workers. Instead, Uber tried to relitigate the earlier case by arguing that the decision to dismiss was not automated after all despite the earlier Court of Appeal finding that the decisions were indeed automated. These arguments were rejected.
In her ruling Judge R.A. Dudok van Heel wrote: It cannot be said that the failure to comply with the order is not serious…….. It may also be the case that Uber is deliberately trying to withhold certain information because it does not want to give an insight into its business and revenue model.
In refusing to suspend or cap the penalty payments the Judge R.A. Dudok van Heel wrote: The high and uncapped periodic penalty payments are not considered disproportionate……these penalty payments can provide sufficient incentive for Uber to comply with the order.
James Farrar, Director of Worker Info Exchange said: Whether it is the UK Supreme Court for worker rights or the Netherlands Court of Appeal for data protection rights, Uber habitually flouts the law and defies the orders of even the most senior courts. Uber drivers and couriers are exhausted by years of merciless algorithmic exploitation at work and grinding litigation to achieve some semblance of justice while government and local regulators sit back and do nothing to enforce the rules. Instead, the UK government is busy dismantling the few protections workers do have against automated decision making in the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill currently before Parliament. Similarly, the proposed EU Platform Work Directive will be a pointless paper tiger unless governments get serious about enforcing the rules.
Anton Ekker, of Ekker law representing the drivers said: Drivers have been fighting for their right to information on automated deactivations for several years now. The Amsterdam Court of Appeal confirmed this right in its principled judgment of 4 April 2023. It is highly objectionable that Uber has so far refused to comply with the Court’s order. However, it is my belief that the principle of transparency will ultimately prevail.
Read more:
Uber ordered to pay €584,000 in penalties for failure to comply with court order

The digital landscape continues to evolve, mainly driven by the ceaseless march of technological innovation. Amid this ever-shifting landscape, ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence (AI) language model developed by OpenAI, has risen to prominence, outshining some of the most dominant players in the online ecosystem.
In particular, data acquired by Finbold indicates that between June 2023 and August 2023, ChatGPT recorded an estimated average of 1.51 billion monthly website visits to its official website chat.openai.com. The figure places ChatGPT in the ninth position overall among the top ten selected major websites by visits. The AI platform is ahead of the streaming giant Netflix, which registered 1.49 billion trips during the same period.
Meanwhile, Google.com, the Alphabet owned search engine, continues to dominate the digital arena with a staggering 85.41 billion visits. Following closely behind is YouTube, with 33.56 billion visits. Facebook, a product of Meta, secures the third position overall with 17.2 billion visits, while Instagram occupies the fourth spot at 6.68 billion. X (formerly Twitter) holds steady with 6.48 billion visits. Notable entities also include e-commerce giant Amazon, which garnered 2.46 billion visits, securing the eighth position in the rankings.
Behind ChatGPT’s rise
ChatGPT’s website visits place the platform among the fastest-growing entities on the internet, considering it less than a year since its launch. Indeed, OpenAI launched the tool at a point when other established traditional players held back due to the uncertainty associated with interactive AI platforms, such as the potential harm it could cause, like spreading misinformation or hate speech.
What distinguishes ChatGPT and positions it for success against established traditional players is its remarkable ability to deliver personalized and diverse content recommendations, answer inquiries, provide comprehensive explanations, and even aid in creative endeavors such as writing, coding, and idea generation.
Its wide-reaching availability across many websites has transformed it into an indispensable companion for internet users in pursuit of instant and pertinent information. It has seamlessly woven itself into the very fabric of the digital world, making appearances on websites, chatbots, applications, and even customer service portals.
ChatGPT’s user-friendly design, which allows interactions as simple as typing a message, appeals to users of all ages and technical proficiencies. This intuitive interface has significantly contributed to the surge in website traffic.
Behind ChatGPT’s rapid rise is also a robust, continuous learning and improvement system. OpenAI’s substantial investments in refining the model, mitigating biases, and expanding its knowledge base ensure that ChatGPT remains current, precise, and dependable.
The underlying design of ChatGPT has placed it to surpass a platform such as Netflix. The streaming service, known for its vast library of movies and TV shows, has long been synonymous with online entertainment. While Netflix specializes in delivering scripted entertainment, ChatGPT appeals to a broader spectrum of users, from students seeking assistance with homework to professionals in need of quick information and inspiration. It’s this ubiquity and adaptability that have allowed ChatGPT to surpass Netflix in website visits.
Dealing with competition
As ChatGPT continues to evolve and expand its capabilities, we will likely witness a profound shift in how we interact with digital technology. The competition between AI models like ChatGPT and traditional content providers like Netflix may drive innovation in both sectors, benefiting consumers by providing more choices and tailored experiences. In this line, some traditional players in the digital space, such as Google, joined the race to incorporate AI into their system by launching the Bard platform. Indeed, such products are likely to expand the dominance of Google at the top of the digital landscape.
However, ChatGPT is countering this rising competition with consistent improvement. The improvement is highlighted by the recent upgrades that saw the platform introduce new features, such as removing the knowledge limit cut-off and the ability to browse the web. In the meantime, the industry will watch the planned AI tool that Tesla CEO Elon Musk developed to rival ChatGPT.
What the future holds
ChatGPT has ignited the race to incorporate AI; its impact is felt across various domains. Numerous companies strive to enhance AI’s capabilities by generating video music and developing detection tools to screen artificially generated content. Most individuals will probably encounter this emerging technology in the near future. The demand has been highlighted by a previous Finbold report that indicated that demand for AI spiked about 500% in 12 months as of August.
Overall, ChatGPT’s meteoric rise in website visitors is a testament to its transformative potential in AI. The success highlights our insatiable appetite for smart, accessible, and versatile AI solutions in an increasingly digital world.
Read more:
ChatGPT overtakes Netflix in web traffic

The best things come in threes, so they say. Others point out that two’s company, three’s a crowd.
For Quickfire Digital co-founders Martin Harper, Fred Cohen and Nathan Lomax three really is the magic number.
Three company founders, three separate skill sets, three perspectives. And, yes, three heads that can butt against each other from time to time.
Not too many businesses are created by a triad (not the organised crime syndicate, we must point out) but it works for us. In this article, we’ll highlight the benefits and point out the challenges to help fellow trios in their quest for success.
How we started
Quickfire Digital – an e-commerce web agency that specialises in the Shopify platform – was formed in the summer of 2017. Each of us had our own micro business, in slightly different areas of digital and web, we got chatting and decided to unite.
We started out by taking pretty much any website or IT project we could get our hands on, utilising existing contacts and beginning to get a feel for how we could work together.
It didn’t take too long to settle into our ‘swim lanes’: Martin is well organised, likes structure and, in his words, ‘just wants to get shit done’; Fred has the ability to get to the root of what a client really needs and how best to achieve that; Nathan is great with people, an eternal optimist and never satisfied.
After a few years of shifting responsibilities, we’ve settled into these roles. Nathan is the agency’s frontman, leading on sales and marketing; Fred’s focus is on client strategies and solutions; Martin takes care of delivery and agency operations, ensuring we hit our profitability targets.
Nathan brings in the clients, Fred solves their problem, Martin gets the shit done.
Being a trio has allowed us to create this neat structure, and it’s been a major positive because it fits within a tried-and-tested creative agency model: Sell > Solve > Sort.
It also points to an obvious, but critical, component within a multi-founder business: Play to your strengths.
Without this delineation of roles, there can be a danger of straying into territory you’re not comfortable with – and, in many cases, rather than improving a situation, it only serves to make it worse.
It’s happened to us. Over the years, and at different times, we’ve all had frustrations that aspects haven’t been moving fast enough or going well – maybe it’s a perceived lack of urgency on recruitment, the way a process is being maintained, or a drop-off on agency performance.
As a founder, you’ve got every right to ask questions and push for answers, but for the relationship with your peers to work, you’ve got to create some boundaries. It’s where agreed accountability comes in, plus it helps shape boardroom agendas.
Listen to understand
Effective communication is something we all strive for, but we’ve learned that the need for it between the three of us is significantly increased. This is for a number of reasons:

It keeps us on our chosen path. Providing clarity on our swim-lane plans means we are fully aligned to maximise growth for the business, and we can be judged against complementary KPIs
It helps with being consistent in our dealings with staff – something that is often overlooked. We might have different opinions on certain issues, but strong communication between the three of us avoids team members receiving conflicting instructions or advice
It leads to better decision-making. Listening to understand can be challenging – especially in the heat of the moment – but it’s so important when working towards a satisfactory outcome. Each of us has a strong personality and we have strong exchanges, but we’re continually aiming to enhance our own emotional intelligence. By listening and not simply waiting to respond, we’ll invariably reach agreement much quicker. Indeed, often we’ll find we’re actually singing from the same hymn sheet, just starting on different notes
It avoids unnecessary conflict. It can be tempting for an individual to take matters into their own hands and live by the mantra of ‘it’s better to seek forgiveness than to ask for permission’ – but if a fellow founder hasn’t been consulted on a major decision then it can spell trouble.

Acknowledge shortcomings – and take action
Growing a business has many challenges, some of which are new to us or beyond our specific knowledge or skills. That’s fine as long as we are able to recognise them and take action.
Leveraging external help to plug gaps is one area we have been particularly strong at – and one we would encourage other founders to seriously consider.
Over the six years of our business, we’ve had mentors, non-exec board members, struck up multiple strategic partnerships, and we currently work with a chairman – who has extensive experience in the creative agency world – and operational specialists.
Putting our egos to one side and admitting where we need help has undoubtedly played a major role in us becoming what we are today.
The external expertise required changes as a business grows. When we started out, we won a lot of projects that were local to us, so it made sense to work with a non-exec director with a strong local presence and a contacts book that brought a lot of value.
As we broadened our horizons and took on the goal of becoming a leader in our field, we required a different level of expertise. Our inspirational chairman, Paul Woolley, wouldn’t have been the right choice when we started out, but he now holds the three of us to account and guides us through his previous experiences of building successful global companies in this space.
In summary, having three founders certainly brings challenges, but it also brings strength in depth. We recommend:

Understanding your individual strengths and taking accountability for agreed swim lanes
Practising effective communication to reach strong outcomes in good time
Staying humble and seeking external support at the right time.

About Us
Martin, Fred and Nathan are co-founders of Quickfire Digital, an e-commerce performance agency specialising in the Shopify platform. Based in Norwich, the seven-figure agency employs 25 people, supports brands around the world, as well as working with multiple external specialists to drive their growth mission forward.
Read more:
Mastering business growth with three founders

Rishi Sunak today announced plans to scrap A-levels and T-levels by combining them into a new single qualification known as the ‘Advanced British Standard’.
In his Tory conference speech, the Prime Minister outlined how the international baccalaureate-style qualification would see pupils study at least five subjects.
Every student will be required to study some form of maths and English to age 18, Mr Sunak said.
He also set out his wish to boost the number of hours that British students spend in the classroom after the age of 16 so it matches other countries.
As he detailed his education shake-up, Mr Sunak said he was ‘pulling one of the biggest levers we have to change the direction of our country’.
He told the Conservative conference in Manchester: ‘We will introduce the new rigorous, knowledge rich Advanced British Standard which will bring together A-Levels and T-Levels into a new, single qualification for our school leavers.
‘First, this will finally deliver on the promise of parity of esteem between academic and technical education because all students will sit the Advanced British Standard.
‘Second, we will raise the floor, ensuring that our children leave school literate and numerate.
‘Because with the Advanced British Standard all students will study some form of English and maths to 18, with extra help for those who struggle most. In our country no child should be left behind.
‘Third, our 16- to 19-year-olds spend around a third less time in the classroom than some of our competitors. We must change this.
‘So, with our Advanced British Standard, students will spend at least 195 hours more with a teacher.
‘And fourth, A-Level students, generally, only do three subjects compared to the seven studied by our economic competitors.
‘The Advanced British Standard will change that too, with students now, typically, studying five subjects.
‘And thanks to the extra teaching time that we are introducing this greater breadth won’t come at the expense of depth which is such a strength of our system.’
Mr Sunak acknowledged his plans would require ‘more teachers in the coming years’.
He announced plans to lure people into teaching key subjects in schools and colleges with tax-free bonuses of up to £30,000 over the first five years of their career.
The PM also promised to make education his ‘main funding priority’ in every review of Whitehall spending.
‘Why? Because it is the closest thing we have to a silver bullet,’ he said.
‘It is the best economic policy, the best social policy, the best moral policy. It the best way to spread opportunity and to create a more prosperous society.
‘It is not just my way. It is the Conservative way.’
Education Secretary Gillian Keegan said the new Advanced British Standard would ‘transform post-16 education so that every child, wherever they live, wherever they come from, receives an education that sets them up for success’.
Read more:
Sunak scraps A-levels and T-levels combining them into new baccalaureate-style ‘Advanced British Standard’ with pupils to study at five subjects including maths and English to 18

Digital infrastructure’s goal is to build a full-fibre broadband network for 1 million premises by 2027.
This equates to roughly 3% of the available market in the UK. Aiming to solve the need for increasing public demand for faster broadband, Charlie Ruddy – CEO of full-fibre network builder Digital Infrastructure and its sister company, BeFibre – has a proven track record driving business growth, major change, organisational restructuring, and cost transformation agendas. When you think about HD streaming, gaming, downloading, video calling and homeworking to name a few, these all require bullet-proof broadband connections to function with efficacy.
A strategic leader with over 30 years’ experience in the telecommunications, electric, water, gas and highways industries, Charlie takes some time out to chat to Business Matters …
What products or services do you provide?
Our programme is about future-proofing our nation and creating an environment for people to work, live and play, and enhancing their connectivity experiences. We want to build a legacy where we positively impact on both society and the economy in equal measure.
What type of businesses do you work with?
As we already know, faster and more reliable connectivity will improve lives – supporting businesses, schools, healthcare, public services and much more.  Our mission is to facilitate wholesale connectivity to multiple businesses and consumers, and we believe provision of a high-speed connection that is always on and reliable, creates outcomes that positively impact all parts of society.
What is your USP?
Because we were founded in 2021, legacy technology doesn’t hold us back – which means we can quickly innovate in a fast-moving market. This provides us with an edge that we’re proud of.
What are your company values?
We recently defined these as part of a brand building project with our digital marketing agency. They are: Be proud, Be awesome, Be bold, and Be customer-focused.
How do you ensure that you recruit a team that reflects your company values?
Being a remote-first organisation doesn’t limit us in terms of the talent pool and, thanks to the recent brand work we invested in, we can be incredibly clear about what our company stands for, our values, and the people we want to surround ourselves with during the recruitment process.
Are you happy to offer a hybrid working model of home/office post-covid?
We’re primarily home-workers – but we do come together in the office regularly to collaborate. The reason behind this was simple – we wanted to recruit the very brightest tech talent from across the UK. Our colleagues stretch from the ‘deep south’ of England, across to the Northwest, where our head office is, and we find it works really well for us.
Do you have any tips for managing suppliers and customers effectively?
Across the landscape, I think it’s important that the language we use is consistent throughout the industry, so partners, suppliers, and customers don’t feel confused – this is an educative piece that we’re all responsible for. That’s the best place to start if we’re to provide hyper-speed connectivity.
Any finance or cash-flow tips for new businesses starting out?
If you’re an investment-backed business, like ours, it’s important that you see yourselves as custodians of those funds – and spend them wisely, as you would your own money. Also, bad news needs to travel first class. Therefore, a robust governance and reporting function, which measure key metrics within the business, should be tasked with reporting the truth at all times.
If you could ask one thing of the government to change for businesses what would it be?
Broadband has become a fourth utility – meaning it’s just as fundamental as water, gas and electricity, particularly for businesses in the UK. As such, the VAT should be at a reduced rate of 5% if eligible – as it is for the rest of the utility market.
What is your attitude towards your competitors?
We’re incredibly transparent about our build plan because we know that it’s all about putting the customer’s needs first. And what they truly want is an honest provider that works at pace and doesn’t break its promises as it delivers fast, reliable FTTP connectivity.
It would be the dream if we could all work together to achieve the common goal, and futureproof the UK’s connectivity – collaboration between altnets vs. a race to ‘land-grab’ areas in the heat of the moment is what’s needed to secure a ‘fit-for-the-future’ infrastructure.
Any thoughts on the future of your company and your dreams?
I believe there is more to do within the industry itself in order to nurture transparency, trust and ways of working together to deliver the UK’s wider connectivity objectives, rather than each organisation focusing on their own commercial outcomes.
My dream would be to get business leaders from across the fibre ecosystem in a room to establish why there is four-times more funding to build the network, and yet we still won’t hit the Government’s timeline of full gigabit capable coverage by 2025. A good starting point should be thinking less about overbuilding to ‘win the network race’ and more about how we can work together to tackle the digital divide.
Read more:
Secrets of Success: Charlie Ruddy, CEO of BeFibre and Digital Infrastructure

Rishi Sunak has announced plans to eventually ban smoking by raising the legal age people can buy cigarettes by one year, every year.
It would mean someone who is currently 14 years old will never be legally be sold a cigarette.
The prime minister said the change would “save more lives than any other decision we could take”.
Sunak told the Conservative Party conference in Manchester on Wednesday that his MPs would be given a free vote on the new law.
It means Tory MPs will not be ordered to back his plan if they do not want to.
The proposal mirrors the law in New Zealand, where tobacco cannot ever be sold to anybody born on or after January 1, 2009.
Commenting on the government’s announcement, Christopher Snowdon, Head of Lifestyle Economics at the free market think tank, the Institute of Economic Affairs, said: “Not only is this prohibitionist wheeze hideously illiberal and unconservative, it is full of holes. It will create a two tier society in which adults buy cigarettes informally from slightly older adults and will inflate the black market in general.
“It may well breach equalities legislation and will very likely be challenged in the courts. It will certainly create huge problems for retailers and may ultimately require a system of national ID cards.”
Read more:
Rishi Sunak announces plan to gradually ban smoking