French swoop spells end of the road for electric vehicle charger firm Pod Point's London listing
Pod Point is set to be bought by French energy giant EDF after the London-listed electric vehicle charger firm's losses mounted last year.
EDF, which already owns roughly 53 per cent of Pod Point, will buy the rest of the group for 6.5p per share. That values it at £10.6million and sets the scene for Pod Point to join the exodus from the London stock market.
A host of firms have been bought and de-listed this year with deals agreed for tech star Alphawave, GP surgery owner Assura and environmental consultancy Ricardo just this week.
The takeover of Pod Point ends a torrid time since it listed at 225p in November 2021. The loss-making group said EDF represents 'the only realistic prospect' for it to continue as a going concern, having been 'reliant' on EDF to execute its strategy since inception.
Pod Point shares fell around a third in January after a slowdown in demand for battery-powered cars dented demand for chargers.
It warned in April that 2025 results would reflect 'ongoing weakness' in electric car sales.
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Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Chelsea's five pricey bosses, Liverpool's gamble on Arne Slot... and Man United's mid-season swoop for Ruben Amorim - where does Thomas Frank rank in the Premier League's most expensive football managers?
Sometimes you have to blow the budget to get what you want. We often see Premier League clubs fork out frankly laughable sums of money to acquire the world's best talent on the pitch. The amount of cash chucked about is growing by the year, and Liverpool 's £116m bid to sign Florian Wirtz is the latest mammoth transfer fee to be thrown down in an era of excessive wealth in the game. The same now goes for managers, too. Gone are the days when clubs would turn to assistant coaches to step up when the hot seat becomes available. Nor do they wait until one falls out of work and they can snap them up for free. No, managers come with a cost now. Your main target is already in a job? Well, it's time to cough up. It has taken £10million for Tottenham to prise Thomas Frank from the grasp of Brentford, where he spent nine years. Funnily enough, he started his tenure as an assistant before becoming the big boss, but as I said: we don't see that anymore. While it's not quite the crazy figures being slapped about for players, it's still a big enough fee to earn Frank a place in the top 10 most expensive Premier League managers of all time. Want to know the other nine? Well, Mail Sport is taking a deep dive into the list - follow us in. =9. Maurizio Sarri - Chelsea - £5m Our first entry includes, you guessed it, Chelsea. Big fees in football and the Blues are like bangers and mash on a plate, they just marry up so well. The first of five Chelsea entries on this list is Maurizio Sarri, who they splashed £5m on to take him from Napoli in 2018. Was it worth it? Well, no, as is the case with a fair few in this top 10. Sarri, whose relationship with the Chelsea fans was less than positive, lasted just one season on the job before returning to Italy with Juventus. But he did win a trophy, as he led the club to Europa League glory. =9. Ronald Koeman - Everton - £5m Arne Slot was not the first Dutchman to land in a dugout on Merseyside. Before the charismatic but calm 46-year-old made the Premier League look like a breeze, his compatriot Ronald Koeman was in the hot seat across Stanley Park. After two highly successful years with Southampton, Everton were so impressed by Koeman that they paid the south coast side £5m for his services back in 2016. At first, it seemed like one hell of a deal. Koeman guided Everton to a seventh-placed finish in his first season in charge, in turn bringing European football back to Goodison Park following a dismal final year under Roberto Martinez. But one year of fun is all he got. Second-season syndrome hit hard for Koeman at Everton, and just two months into it he was sacked following a horrendous start to the campaign. 8. Jose Mourinho - Chelsea - £5.2m The Special One. The one that changed Chelsea. The one that brought glory to Stamford Bridge. As we all well know, Chelsea don't always hit the nail on the head when it comes to financial decisions, as will be evident the further through this feature you read. However, paying £5.2m to bring in Jose Mourinho from Porto may just be the smartest move they have made, and might ever make. It was a bold move at the time. Mourinho had just produced a miracle by winning the Champions League with Porto, but that sum of money was a massive deal in those days compared to the pennies it is seen as now. Worth every penny, and some. The Portuguese maverick guided a new-look Blues to their first top-flight title in 50 years in his very first season, before going back-to-back in his second. It was pure bliss for Roman Abramovich and the Stamford Bridge faithful - they had ripped Manchester United and Arsenal off their perch and looked unstoppable. Well, it didn't last. The third season brought a domestic cup double, but no Premier League title, and in September 2007 he surprisingly left the club. Mourinho couldn't stay away of course, but that's a story for another day. 7. Brendan Rodgers - Leicester - £8.8m Now, this is where things go up a gear. There is a sudden jump in terms of sums of money, starting with Brendan Rodgers. Following his sacking by Liverpool in 2015 - despite nearly winning the Premier League a year prior - Rodgers' stocks were low. No English side wanted to take a punt on him. Celtic gave him a lifeline, though, and boy did he take it. Rodgers flourished during an initial three-year stint in Glasgow and it took Leicester City a whopping £8.8m to drag him away from the Bhoys. The Northern Irishman's tenure began brilliantly with back-to-back fifth-place finishes in his first two full seasons, which would now be enough to earn a spot in the Champions League. Rodgers even led the club to their first-ever FA Cup triumph, beating Chelsea in the 2021 final. However, things soon went downhill and he was sacked in 2023 in the final months of what had been a dreadful campaign, in which the Foxes were relegated. 6. Ruben Amorim - Manchester United - £9.25m Manchester United's move for Ruben Amorim has cost them more than just money, that's for sure. You don't need me to tell you that his arrival has not got to plan, thus far. The hierarchy at Old Trafford initially opted to hand Erik ten Hag a new deal last summer, which meant the cost of sacking him and bringing in Amorim became much higher than it needed to be. Overall, roughly £21m was spent to fire the Dutchman and hire the Portuguese boss from Sporting Lisbon. All of that money to end up with a record-low Premier League points tally, their worst finish on record, their lowest-ever goal tally, and an abject defeat to Tottenham in the Europa League final. Now, Amorim is still in charge and he could miraculously turn things around which would mean the money was worth it. But based on the evidence so far, it doesn't look like it was. 5. Arne Slot - Liverpool - £9.42m 'Arne Slot! Na-na, na, na-na!' Jurgen Klopp was the first to sing it and now it's a song belted out on the Anfield terraces with pride with each passing week. Nobody thought that Klopp could be replaced, but the same was said about Bill Shankly. Slot is the Bob Paisley of his time, and he only cost the Reds hierarchy £9.42m. Just 8.12 per cent of the amount the club are paying to bring in the mercurial Wirtz from Bayer Leverkusen. The German will do extremely well to even get close to having the impact that Slot has had on Liverpool. Few managers just rock up to what is known as the toughest league in the world and make it look like a cakewalk in their first season. Mourinho did it 20 years ago, and Slot followed in his footsteps by bringing home a record-equalling 20th English top-flight title to Anfield. Even if the Dutchman struggles to win another in the coming seasons, the fee to bring him to Merseyside from Feyenoord will still have been worth it. =3. Enzo Maresca - Chelsea - £10m As you can see, the further up the list we go, the more recent the deals were made. And of course, the more Chelsea are involved. We have hit double figures for the first time in this feature, with Enzo Maresca being wrestled away from Leicester last summer, following an impressive promotion from the Championship - which was short-lived - for £10m. The move for the Italian has paid off, so far. In his first season in charge, Maresca guided Chelsea back to the promised land of the Champions League through a fourth-placed finish, while he also picked up the Conference League trophy as the cherry on top. Many questioned the appointment at the time, but 12 months on it is plausible to see Chelsea as challengers to Liverpool and Slot's crown next season. Maresca has done a stellar job. =3. Thomas Frank - Tottenham - £10m Here we are. The newest entry into the charts has landed alongside Maresca in third spot. When Ange Postecoglou was sacked, there was an outpouring of rage in WhatsApp group chats around the country, in offices, and on social media. Everywhere. Football fans simply couldn't believe it. After all, the Australian delivered on his promise. 'I always win things in my second year,' Postecoglou said in September, and that is exactly what he did by winning Tottenham's first trophy in 17 years via the Europa League. Still, that didn't matter to Daniel Levy who decided to hand £10m to fellow Londoners Brentford in order to bring Frank to north London, and all of a sudden the rage is no more. Whether the money will be worth it is yet to be seen, but what is telling is how Frank has managed to calm the outrage of Postecoglou's sacking simply by being appointed. That's how perfect of a fit he appears to be for the role. 2. Andre Villas-Boas - Chelsea - £13.3m The Not-so-Special One. Andre Villas-Boas was meant to be Mourinho incarnate - 'Mini Mourinho' he was once dubbed. Well, he ended up more like the Mourinho we witnessed struggle at Tottenham, or even worse. When Chelsea splashed a then eye-watering £13.5m on 33-year-old Villas-Boas to take the reins at Stamford Bridge in 2011, excitement matched the levels of when the great Portuguese boss was appointed in 2004. He was brought in as a young gun to spark life into what was an aging squad at the time, but all he succeeded in doing was nearly kill them off. Villas-Boas didn't even last the season. In March 2012, he was put out of his misery after unrest in the dressing room and amongst the fanbase. Chelsea would go on to produce a miracle in Munich two months later, winning their first Champions League title under interim boss Roberto Di Matteo, while Villas-Boas moved across London to bitter rivals Tottenham, where he would also struggle. 1. Graham Potter - Chelsea - £21.5m £3.07m. That's how much Graham Potter ended up costing Chelsea each month he was in charge. Just the seven, but it felt like a lifetime for those in Blue. Potter's arrival was meant to signify a new era at Stamford Bridge under Todd Boehly and his big-spending crew, but it ended up being a false dawn. To spend £21.5m on bringing Potter in from Brighton to then only give him seven months was baffling, but it shows just how badly things went for the English manager in west London. Most expensive managers in English football history 1. Graham Potter (Chelsea) - £21.5m 2. Andre Villas-Boas (Chelsea) - £13.3m =3. Thomas Frank (Tottenham) - £10m =3. Enzo Maresca (Chelsea) - £10m 5. Arne Slot (Liverpool) - £9.42m 6. Ruben Amorim (Manchester United) - £9.42m 7. Brendan Rodgers (Leicester City) - £8.8m 8. Jose Mourinho (Chelsea) - £5.2m =9. Ronald Koeman (Everton) - £5m =9. Maurizio Sarri (Chelsea) - £5m He had a promising start at the helm, going unbeaten in his first nine games, but it was all downhill from there. Boehly and BlueCo's patience for the Potter project wore thin rapidly, and by April 2023 they sent him packing, taking a huge financial hit in the process. Potter now manages at the other end of London at rivals West Ham, and has once again struggled to get going. But he is a slow-burner, and next season will be pivotal in the Hammers' new horizon.
Times
an hour ago
- Times
The same, but different: our new website explained
People generally take a dim view of unexpected change in the daily staples of their lives, including the design of their newspapers. So the top brass here were prepared for a bit of flak when they overhauled our digital offering. A lot of the rumpus centred on problems with finding items that had previously been reached with a couple of nonchalant clicks, but to judge by readers' comments and emails, most are getting their bearings again. One aspect of our overhauled website and app that may be less obvious to readers is that it completes the transition away from so-called edition-based publishing, an approach inherited from print that does not work well for fast-moving online news. Again, some readers, used to a once or twice-daily serving of stories, have found this disconcerting, such as Tim Dawson, who was puzzled not to have been able to track down online a piece he had read in print. 'I had assumed that all of your daily content was available via the app and the website,' Tim said. 'Is this not the case, and if it is not, how much of the content is not offered via the app and the website?' Our head of digital, Edward Roussel, explained why an article might appear in print but not digital. Breaking news stories appear first online and in the app. A version is later prepared for print. There is no value in taking the print article and publishing it online as we would be duplicating stories. In other words, the print and digital articles may be substantially different. Second, he said, we edit the app in the same way as we edit print. That is to say, we determine an optimum number of daily stories, across a dozen broad areas of coverage, and focus on the quality of those stories. 'One thing we don't do,' Edward stressed, 'is simply dump all print stories online.' That used to happen at many newspapers in times gone by, but it does not make for a happy reading experience. We publish on average 185 stories a day digitally. A midweek edition of the print newspaper, consisting of the main section and Times2, has about 140 to 150, but when you add Bricks & Mortar, The Game and all the weekend sections, the daily average exceeds 200. So, yes, it's true some print stories do not appear in our digital editions — but, given that a digital facsimile of the print paper is available in the Live app, on the website and even as a standalone app, no one need miss a word. The eagle eye of Stephen Pilbeam of Southampton alighted on a divot in our report on the dentist who unexpectedly found himself playing in the US Open. 'You say Matt Vogt has struggled with 'the Wurlitzer of emotions he has ridden since he qualified'. I suggest Mr Vogt may have ridden emotional rollercoasters, waltzers and whirlwinds, but merely played a Wurlitzer.' Hole in one. The Wurlitzer firm, founded in 1850s Cincinnati, began by importing musical instruments from Germany and moved into making pianos and then the organs that accompanied silent films. Jukeboxes followed — but no modes of transport, unless you count the organ that rises out of a pit in Blackpool Tower. In time the jukebox and organ operations split, but both were eventually owned by Gibson, the guitar brand favoured by Les Paul, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page and Angus Young of AC/DC, not to mention James Hetfield of Metallica. I don't think we can claim, though, that Vogt felt as if he had been thunderstruck, or riding the lightning. I must confess I've not read Ronald McIntosh's 1990 blockbuster Hyphenation: Discussion of the Changing Principles of Word Division, so I am not an authority on a subject considered 'stretchingly difficult' by Fowler's, but our style guide has wise advice on hyphens, which boils down to: use sparingly. They are tolerated in words with prefixes to prevent a collision of identical letters, as in co-opt and pre-empt, and likewise in composite terms such as cut-throat. Which will not, you might think, be much comfort to Dale Savage of Loughton, who complained: 'Your paper seems to have dispensed with the hyphen when appending a prefix to another word. This creates confusion to the eye and brain, trying to figure out what this strange new word is. When modifying a word with a prefix, please use a hyphen. The worst and most common example is 'miniseries'.' I can see that 'miniseries' looks like the love child of miseries and ministries, which sounds like gripping TV and is presumably why our style guide does prescribe a hyphen in mini-series. When it comes to radioisotopes, though, we're less accommodating. The outing for the cod-Latin motor bus poem last week was a trip down memory lane for David Marchant of Kent and Nuala Lonie of Linlithgow. For David it brought back Latin for Today and translating Fabula de Petro Cuniculo for bedtime stories — 'still a standard joke in my family as we recall Dominus McGregor'. Nuala impressively 'dredged up from memory' some extra couplets I had not included. Peter Lowthian of Marlow was thinking about Tolkien — who, you may recall, didn't write the poem. He had been to an exhibition at the British Library that 'featured some of Tolkien's correspondence, including a fan letter from Joni Mitchell, which I suspect impressed me more than it did him. Quite a few people wrote to him in the languages he invented, which Tolkien corrected in red ink and sent straight back again.' One of those red marks would have ornamented my column last week, for I erroneously referred to 'Elvish languages' when I clearly meant 'Elven' — many thanks to Ben Rapp for setting me straight on the correct way to refer to imaginary tongues. Write to Feedback by emailing feedback@ or by post to 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Boeing 787 Dreamliner: a passenger and airline favourite, with some nightmares along the way
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner was the first truly 21st-century big jet. More than 1,000 are in service, and many passengers rate it more highly than other aircraft. The carbon-fibre twin-engined 787 was designed partly as a replacement for Boeing's veteran 767 – but also to introduce passenger-friendly benefits such as larger windows and higher cabin pressure. The Dreamliner was also accountant friendly, burning about one-fifth less fuel than the 767, and allowed airlines' network planners to dream of ultra-long routes. The daily Qantas nonstop between London Heathrow and Perth in Western Australia, covering over 9,000 miles, is a doddle for a suitably configured 787. Boeing's bet was that an efficient aircraft with plenty of range would enable plenty of previously unserved city pairs to be flown profitably. The wager at arch-rival Airbus was different: think big. Going one step beyond the 747 Jumbo jet by extending the double deck for the length of the aircraft. The European engineers came up with world's largest people-mover: the Airbus A380 'SuperJumbo'. Both the 787 and A380 endured long and troubled gestations, but the Airbus plane was first in service – beating the 787 by a couple of years. To the chagrin of the Toulouse-based planemaker, few airlines were impressed. It was a 20th-century concept, with four thirsty engines to nourish and maintain. Only Emirates has ordered the Airbus A380 at scale, to feed its mega-hub in Dubai. In contrast the 787 has been a plane for all seasons. Europe's biggest holiday company, Tui, has 13 of the jets. They can shuttle hundreds of holidaymakers efficiently between the UK and the Mediterranean in summer, then in winter show off their long legs to the Caribbean and South East Asia. Premier league airlines configure the Dreamliner for comfort: British Airways has a total of 42 in service and on order, while Virgin Atlantic has 17 – with names like Dream Girl and Dream Jeannie. But the choice of engines that both the UK carriers chose have proved something of a nightmare. The Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engine, 'optimised specifically to power the Boeing 787 Dreamliner family' has been unkindly described by aircraft engineers as having 'chocolate fan blades'. A shortage of serviceable aircraft caused both BA and Virgin to cancel routes to Kuala Lumpur and Accra respectively. Yet at least the 787 is now flying at scale. For three months in 2013, the young plane was grounded worldwide because of fears of conflagration involving the lithium batteries that were installed: a newly arrived Ethiopian Airlines Dreamliner from Addis Ababa burst into flames at Heathrow. No one was hurt, but the plane was banned from flying until Boeing came up with a fix. More recently, safety shortcomings at the US manufacturer have come under the spotlight. And the first fatal crash of the 787 on Thursday 12 June, killing hundreds in Ahmedabad, will sharply increase the focus on the plane's airworthiness. Investigators sifting through the wreckage of the Air India jet will pore over the components that are still intact after the impact and subsequent fire to see if some kind of systems failure had contributed to the disaster. Were a previously unidentified design flaw to be identified, resulting in another worldwide grounding order, global aviation would be traumatised: already the number of active long-haul aircraft are struggling to meet demand, and removing more than 1,000 wide-bodied planes would wreck millions of travel plans. Meanwhile, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner is approaching middle age on the aircraft spectrum – and the younger Airbus A350 has stolen its most-preferred title. Between London and Doha, Qatar Airways consigns its first-edition 787s to the Gatwick budget route, rather that the pricier premium Heathrow link. These tired-looking high-density aircraft are also deployed on low-revenue routes such as Doha-Kathmandu. My experience from Gatwick via the Gulf hub to the Nepali capital on back-to-back 787s last October was uncomfortable and joyless. Yet Gulf rival Emirates will soon welcome dozens of Dreamliners into its fleet for the first time. British travellers are likely to be flying on the 787 for a couple of decades yet. But after the tragedy in Ahmedabad, passengers' appreciation of the Dreamliner may diminish.
