The UK Is Struggling to Shake Off the Bond Vigilantes
'High levels of public debt are a significant vulnerability that governments can no longer ignore,' was what Bank for International Settlements chief Agustin Carstens warned in his final speech in June. That echoed a cacophony of alarm bells from global monetary officials over the past months and years.
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Yahoo
28 minutes ago
- Yahoo
ProSieben investor General Atlantic opts for Czech PPF offer, shuns MFE, sources say
MUNICH (Reuters) -Financial investor General Atlantic has tendered its 2.4% stake in German media group ProSiebenSat.1 to Czech investment company PPF, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday. By taking PPF's cash offer of 7 euros ($8.17) per share for ProSieben, General Atlantic is going against the endorsement of ProSieben's management for a higher rival offer by MFE-MediaForEurope, which is partly paid in MFE shares, indicating that MFE faces some difficulties in its bid for control over ProSieben. General Atlantic, PPF and ProSieben declined to comment. MFE did not immediately respond to a request for comment. ($1 = 0.8567 euros)
New York Times
30 minutes ago
- New York Times
How David Moyes and Everton stole a march on their rivals to sign Jack Grealish
A gamble worth taking. That was the view of senior figures connected to Everton and owners The Friedkin Group as the club weighed up an ambitious move to sign Jack Grealish from Manchester City. As far as they were concerned, the risk attached did not outweigh the potential reward. Instead, the general feeling was that the move had the potential to be a game-changer, ushering in a new, more ambitious era for Everton. Advertisement The Merseyside club had long been aware of Grealish's potential availability in this window, having kept close tabs on his situation throughout the summer. They also knew he would not come cheap, with City initially favouring either a permanent transfer or a loan with full wage coverage. Everton could not go quite that far, even with the billionaire backing of The Friedkin Group (TFG). Internal estimates suggested they could stretch to an overall package of around £12million ($16.2m) for the season if required, which would make Grealish comfortably the highest-paid player at the club. At certain points, there was a suspicion the 29-year-old England international would be pushed elsewhere, towards a more advantageous financial deal, or that a club able to offer Champions League football in a campaign leading up to the World Cup would lean on him to plug a gap that had emerged during their pre-season. Grealish, though, let it be known that he wanted Everton. Those regular checks, made throughout the off-season, paid dividends, as did the intervention of the manager David Moyes, who made a compelling case during talks. Discussions, formal and otherwise, took place over a couple of months, then, as reported by The Athletic, accelerated last week between the clubs. Negotiations on the Everton side were handled by head of trading Nick Hammond and new chief executive Angus Kinnear. At that stage, Grealish had already made up his mind. The attacking midfielder had expected to be plying his trade away from City in the coming season since the end of the last one but, much like Everton, pushed for the move to happen now rather than right at the end of the window in late August, after the campaign had begun. His desire to join Everton helped to smooth out the process during talks. For him, hitting the ground running in a World Cup season is key, given his lingering international aspirations. The momentum was such that much of the excitable chatter at Everton's new Hill Dickinson Stadium on Saturday, as the first team played their final pre-season friendly against Italian visitors Roma there, was about the prospect of Grealish being in situ before the opening fixture away to promoted Leeds on Monday, August 18. Advertisement An outline agreement was subsequently reached between the two clubs on Monday. Though at that stage, some finer details were still being thrashed out. This was a complex deal, including discussions on how image rights and bonuses from his City contract could be translated into the new agreement. Yet there was enough confidence on both sides for the medical to happen at Everton's usual facility in Newton-le-Willows, a small market town midway between Liverpool and Manchester. There, in his velour tracksuit, Grealish posed for photos with excited Everton fans ahead of the move being confirmed. He joined officially on Tuesday, before heading to the stadium to go through his media duties with club channels. Grealish, who turns 30 on September 10, arrived at the new £800million facility on Liverpool's waterfront to find his name up on the big screen and on the LED advertising boards around the pitch. It is early days, but the club are doing their best to make him feel at home. Everton see this as a statement signing — their first of those since Colombia captain James Rodriguez's free-transfer arrival from Real Madrid in September 2020 and a potentially symbolic moment for the new ownership. After years of penny-pinching and doom-laden financial predictions, the club's era of austerity looks very much over. Everton will cover around three-quarters of Grealish's £300,000 a week salary, with City valuing Grealish at £50million if the move is to be made permanent next summer. That final bit is a conversation for another day, though. For now, the belief is that Everton have landed much-needed star quality for the first season of their new stadium — and a potential coup if Grealish can get anywhere close to recapturing the form of old. Grealish was not short of admirers, even if his situation at City created a considerable barrier to entry for interested parties. He had been disappointed with his lack of minutes last season and knew it was time to move on after four years at the Etihad, while the club had also planned for life without him. Advertisement Fellow Premier League side West Ham monitored the situation, while a potential move to Italian side Napoli was discussed. Celtic expressed interest, but Grealish never seriously considered a move to Scotland. Turkey's Fenerbahce were among the most significant contenders, and could have got close to meeting City's financial demands. There was a sense from others involved in the deal that Grealish was being pushed in that direction, but the midfielder was not keen on moving to Istanbul. He had sought advice from friends regarding a potential transfer to Turkish football and was keen to remain in the Premier League. A decisive intervention from Moyes swung the matter in Everton's favour. During lengthy talks between the Scot, Grealish and the player's camp, it was emphasised that he would be a key pillar in Moyes' setup this season. Discussions also centred on where he would fit into the side, with Grealish likely to drift between the No 10 role and left flank. It was felt that Moyes was likely to be a positive influence on the player at a pivotal moment in his career. While Everton started the summer by bringing in youngsters such as 22-year-old Thierno Barry and Adam Aznou, 19, Moyes wanted to add more Premier League experience as well as a marquee signing to excite the supporters. He was backed in that pursuit by the owners and CEO Kinnear. All of that was important to Grealish in what is a World Cup year. He is desperate to get back in the England fold, having not made a squad since winning the most recent of his 34 senior international caps against Finland last October, and has held positive talks with national-team manager Thomas Tuchel. He knows he needs to play regularly at club level to be considered, with the prospect of participation in the tournament in North America next summer a key motivation. Everton sold their project to him. Alongside the sense that he would be the main man in their attack, they are showing ambition with their new stadium and other work in the transfer market. Moyes is targeting another three or four new additions before the end of the window, with new wingers, a central midfielder and a right-back on his list. There was a sense that Grealish needed to be somewhere he felt valued. During a summer trip to the Spanish resort of Marbella, he bumped into former Everton captain Alan Stubbs, who emphasised how much he would be loved by the club's fanbase. Advertisement Positive references about the place came from players who have featured more recently for Everton, with goalkeeper Jordan Pickford a friend from England duty and represented by the same CAA Stellar agency. Everton's relationship with Stellar is positive following discussions with one of their other clients, striker Liam Delap, before his move from Ipswich Town to Chelsea earlier this summer. Also, in signing for Everton, Grealish will avoid having to relocate from his Cheshire home. He will wear the No 18 shirt at his new club. The No 8 was also vacant, but the Birmingham-born midfielder decided to follow in the footsteps of two personal heroes, Paul Gascoigne and Wayne Rooney, who both wore 18 at Everton. 'I spoke to Wayne before I came here and I mentioned that to him – about the number 18 – so I hope he's happy as well,' Grealish said. There is no guarantee this move will work out, but all parties felt confident enough to give it a go. Creating the right conditions for Grealish to succeed at Everton will be key if he is to return to the form that led to a British record £100million move from Aston Villa to City in the summer of 2021. With no major national-team competition this summer and having been left out of City's squad for the Club World Cup ahead of a potential move, Grealish has had a long break to relax and refresh. There have been family holidays and trips to Marbella, while he also spent time working on his fitness with a personal trainer. Grealish is set to train with his new team-mates this week, making him available for that season opener at Leeds next Monday, if selected. As stated earlier, he is understood to be desperate to hit the ground running and make an impression. Everton will afford him the opportunity to do just that, albeit at considerable cost. A gamble worth taking? We're about to find out. Whatever happens, it's likely to be fun. And Everton fans have not had anywhere near enough of that in recent seasons. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle
Forbes
30 minutes ago
- Forbes
How Collaborations Are Helping London Biotechs Find A Route To Market
Partnerships and collaborations provide an important means for life sciences and healthtech startups to validate their technologies, secure financial backing and navigate a route to market. London, with its concentration of teaching hospitals, universities and research institutions, all sitting in close proximity to local and global VC firm headquarters, may be well placed to nurture the next generation of health innovators. The challenge is to make the most of the existing ecosystem. When it comes down to raising VC finance, Britain's healthtech and life sciences startups are doing rather well. Witness the last set of quarterly figures published by HSBC Innovation Banking and Dealroom. According to the data, healthtech businesses raised $1.8 billion in the first three months of this year, the largest sum since the second quarter of 2021. More than half the money raised went to businesses developing AI solutions. And the government is playing its part in boosting the sector. For instance, earlier this year, Finance Minister Rachel Reeves announced a £29 billion boost for Britain's National Health Service, with £10 billion of that earmarked for investment in new technologies. To underline that point, an initiative dubbed the Innovator Passport will allow digital solutions tested in one health organisation to be rolled out across others without further checks. This could be hugely important in the U.K., where the national health system is administered locally through trusts that tend to work independently of each other. It's all part of a 'Modern Industrial Strategy' plan aimed at helping the U.K. to become a 'world leader' in health-related technologies. All well and good, but small life sciences and healthtech companies still face the challenge of proving the efficacy of their solutions and also demonstrating how they can be integrated into existing clinical systems. The Partnership Solution One way forward for technology-led startups is to partner with bigger players that can provide resources and access to markets that might otherwise be out of reach. David Roblin is CEO and co-founder of Relation Therapeutics, a company that is collaborating with pharmaceutical giant GSK on developing treatments for osteoarthritis and fibrosis. As he explains, the company was established to bring together people from disparate scientific disciplines and working backgrounds, with the aim of developing an interdisciplinary approach to drug discovery. In practical terms this means that biologists working in the field of genomics, cells and tissues are working alongside experts in machine learning and R&D. As Roblin sees it, the collaboration is helping partner GSK to develop treatments for the targeted illnesses more quickly than would otherwise be the case. "Trying to innovate in a big company with established processes is quite a challenge,' says Roblin. "GSK had all the elements but they didn't have the blank sheet of paper to bring the technologies to bear at the right time and at the right pace.' In return, he says, the relationship with GSK has enhanced Relation Therapeutics' profile and credibility. Indeed, Roblin says the deal played an important part in helping his business secure a $65 million Seed round. "The collaboration was quite important in closing the seed round. GSK brought cash, validation and they also brought ideas and a deep understanding of the diseases,' he says, Every partnership is different in terms of the benefits it delivers. Pangaea Data is a U.K.-based company that has developed a platform that can help clinicians identify hard-to-diagnose diseases. This is achieved by using AI to analyse patient symptoms mapped against models created using existing clinical guidelines. The company says the platform has been used to accelerate diagnoses across 42 conditions. Last month, Pangaea Data announced a partnership with AstraZeneca-owned Alexion Pharmaceuticals. Under the arrangement, Pangaea will configure its platform to detect Hypophosphatisia (HPP), a bone-softening genetic disorder. So what does the collaboration deliver? Well as co-founder Vibhor Gupta acknowledges, once a technology solution has been developed, the challenge is to find a pathway through which the product can be introduced to health systems. "There is the question of who will pay for it,' he says. 'That's why the partnership with Alexion is important. They have a treatment for HPP. We can use the partnership to allow health systems to identify patients who are hiding in plain sight. In other words, there is a symbiosis. Alexion has a treatment for the condition. Pangaea provides a means to find patients who are currently undiagnosed and thus slipping through the treatment net. As Gupta explains, pharmaceutical companies are solutions-driven. 'They don't necessarily have all the data they need - health systems have that - but what they do possess is the motivation to close care gaps and get patients to the right treatment or trials,' he says.' A Collaborative Ecosystem The benefits of collaboration extend far beyond commercial relationships between two companies. For instance, there may also be opportunities for life sciences and health-tech startups to work with universities and research institutes, sharing labs, resources and expertise. This kind of collaboration can be arranged and orchestrated across countries and continents if need be, but it can be - to say the least - helpful if potential partners are situated within walking distance of each other and perhaps meeting regularly at the same events. That's the view of Mike Wiseman, Head of Campuses, at business space provider British Land. Included in his company's portfolio is Regents Place, a mix of labs and office spaces situated on London's Euston Road, an area increasingly referred to as the Knowledge Quarter. As Wiseman points out, the district is home to Meta, Google and Deepmind, along with the Francis Crick medical research institute, The Alan Turing Institute (data and AI) , the University of London and a host of science and technology companies. British Land is positioning Regents Place as a campus for AI and health technology. 'We have a community of likeminded people. Some of the most exciting advances in science are at the intersection of different disciplines and we can facilitate that through spaces and events," says Wiseman. To that end, the company has signed a memo of understanding to work with the University of London on events and there is also an arrangement with the Crick Institute that allows startups from Regents to share lab facilities. Wiseman says this bodes well for the future. London still lags Boston as a health tech and life sciences hub but the building blocks are in place. As he points out, in addition to possible collaborators, regulators and investors are also close at hand. 'You also have access to patients through the NHS and the private clinics of Harley Street. There are very few places like this," he adds. Another complex, Triton Square. is due to open shortly. There is a bigger picture. London is part of the so-called Golden Triangle that also includes Oxford and Cambridge and there is collaboration not just within but between cities. However, startups are likely to benefit from being in proximity to sources of support.
