Latest news with #Sunak
Korea Herald
23-05-2025
- Business
- Korea Herald
SK Networks President Sunghwan Choi encounters former UK Prime Minister
SEOUL, South Korea, May 21, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- SK Networks, aiming to evolve into an "AI-focused business holding company", is intensifying its initiatives to enhance collaboration and expand its operations through a global network. In this context, Sunghwan Choi, President & COO of SK Networks, who has been steering the tech-focused AI operations of the headquarters and its subsidiaries, reportedly met with former UK Prime Minister Sunak to explore methods for improving exchanges and corporate collaboration between the two nations. As stated by company representatives, this Tuesday at The Shilla Seoul, President Choi and former Prime Minister Sunak held a breakfast meeting to exchange global trends and discuss AI and other technological collaborations between nations and corporations. SK Networks founded Hico Capital (now SK Networks Americas) in Silicon Valley, USA, in 2020. The company has been concentrating on global investments in and partnerships with technology firms centered around Hicosystem, the human network associated with future expansion sectors. The opportunity for an unexpected in-person meeting between Rishi Sunak, who visited South Korea for an international conference, and Sunghwan Choi is believed to stem from this network. During this meeting, the pair shared perspectives on the current state of the global economy. They also discussed approaches to enhance relations between the two countries from the viewpoints of a politician and a business leader, as well as the possibilities and examples of AI collaboration at both national and corporate levels. In this context, President Choi presented innovative AI-based cases and global strategies from SK Group and SK Networks, expressing optimism that, in line with current trends, the company's AI endeavors would grow in the UK and across Europe, aiding the advancement of human civilization. The industry has high expectations for the future potential of SK Networks, which is evolving into an AI company. In particular, NAMUH x held a showcase last month and received a favorable response from participants for its groundbreaking air purification and vital sign monitoring capabilities powered by AI. The brand intends to expand into the international market, including the US and Malaysia, following its official launch in Korea in July. It was established from the resources of SK Magic and is strategically overseen by SK Networks. NAMUH x manages its brand communication independently, emphasizing innovative technologies and services that differentiate it from SK Magic's existing products. PhnyX Lab, an AI startup comprised of Silicon valley talent, introduced a modular RAG (retrieval augmented generation) solution for the pharmaceutical sector named Cheiron at the end of last year and is preparing for market growth by forming tailored partnerships with businesses. The heads of SK Magic and PhnyX Lab attended the meeting alongside President Choi and former Prime Minister Sunak. Former Prime Minister Sunak stated, "AI holds the key to transforming the future of drug development. It promises new levels of speed and precision that could help hundreds of millions of patients around the world." He added, "Phynx Lab's Cherion looks like the kind of technology that has the potential to play an important part in this revolution." SK Networks' efforts in collaborating and partnering with prominent global personalities and firms are expected to enhance its position as an AI enterprise.
NDTV
16-05-2025
- Business
- NDTV
King Charles Climbs Up UK Rich List, Matches Rishi Sunak's Wealth
London: Britain's King Charles III saw his wealth grow by around GBP 30 million over the past year to hit GBP 640 million in the 2025 'Sunday Times Rich List' released on Friday, with the 76-year-old monarch climbing 20 places to rank 238th alongside former prime minister Rishi Sunak and his wife Akshata Murty. The annual tally of the country's 350 wealthiest individuals and families was topped for the fourth consecutive year by the Indian-origin Hinduja family, with an estimated fortune of GBP 35.3 billion, despite taking a hit of GBP 2 billion since May 2024. "Awarding licences to build wind farms has helped the Crown Estate double its profits, increasing the sovereign grant, which funds the royal family's official activities," the newspaper notes with reference to Charles' boosted fortunes. "We exclude the majority of royal assets from the King's valuation because they are owned 'in the right of the Crown' and are not personal holdings. His Balmoral and Sandringham estates in Scotland and Norfolk, as well as an investment portfolio also inherited from his late mother [Queen Elizabeth II], account for the bulk of his wealth," it notes. Meanwhile, Sunak saw a dent in his family fortunes since last year with Murty's stake in Infosys losing some of its value on the stock market, but the couple's combined estimated fortunes of GBP 640 million means they improved their rank from last year's 245th. "Since leaving Downing Street, Sunak has taken a part-time role at Stanford University and signed up to the lucrative Washington Speakers Bureau," reads 'The Sunday Times' analysis. "His wife's stake in Infosys, her father's Bangalore-based IT firm, paid out GBP 7.5 million of dividends last year but has lost some of its value. The couple have launched a charity to tackle numeracy problems," it adds. Besides the Hinduja family, the top 10 of the 2025 'Sunday Times Rich List' sees another set of India-born brothers, David and Simon Reuben, build on their wealth to rise to second place from last year's third, with a fortune estimated at around GBP 26.87 billion. At No. 8 is NRI tycoon of Arcelor Mittal steelworks Lakshmi N. Mittal, who holds on to his rank with an estimated GBP 15.44 billion. Vedanta Resources' industrialist Anil Agarwal with an estimated GBP 7.5 billion is at No. 25. Other Indian-origin billionaires on the 2025 list include textiles entrepreneur Prakash Lohia at No. 31 with an estimated GBP 6.02 billion; retail majors Mohsin and Zuber Issa at No. 32 with GBP 6 billion; and pharma chiefs Navin and Varsha Engineer at 48 with GBP 3.45 billion. Among the top 100 richest Britons are brothers Simon, Bobby and Robin Arora at No. 69 with GBP 2.57 billion and leading NRI industrialist Lord Swraj Paul and family ranked 81st with an estimated wealth of GBP 2 billion. On the whole, the latest edition of the rich list reveals the sharpest fall in billionaire numbers in its 37-year history - sliding to 156 this year from 165 in 2024. "This year - the 37th edition - has been one of the toughest to compile due to [US President] Donald Trump's tariffs and the ensuing stock market turbulence," said Robert Watts, compiler of the annual rankings for 'The Sunday Times'. "It shows the third year in a row that collective wealth has fallen and the biggest drop in the number of UK billionaires in the Rich List history. It is a stark reflection of the state of UK wealth," he said. The valuations for this year's list were carried out between November 2024 and April 2025.
New European
15-05-2025
- Business
- New European
A bit of pocket money for Rishi Sunak
But Sunak, who remains MP for Richmond and Northallerton when not working as a visiting fellow at California's Stanford University, has just topped up the family coffers with his first reported bumper speaking engagement payment. With his wife Akshata Murty set to pocket £7.7 million in dividend pay from family firm Infosys next month, former prime minister Rishi Sunak would be forgiven were he never to work again and spend his days with his feet up watching cricket. The former Tory leader has just registered with the House of Commons authorities a whopping £160,750 – not too far off what he earned annually for being PM – for a single three-hour speech to private equity firm Bain Capital, the former employer of Mitt Romney which caused him such trouble during his failed 2012 bid for the US presidency. Sunak's speech was booked via the Washington Speakers Bureau, the agency which also acts for fellow former Tory PMs Theresa May, David Cameron and John Major along with Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and the latter's wife Sarah. At approximately £53,583 an hour, it's nice work if you can get it! Read more: Jonathan Guillis finally gets a job The Sunaks had made much of the setting up of The Richmond Project, a new charity focused on improving numeracy, in March, although it has yet to formally launch. The Office of Akshata Murty and Rishi Sunak was also registered as an unlimited business venture at Companies House last November, its 'unlimited' structure removing the need to make its accounts public. Murty, meanwhile, is set to see her dividend income from tech firm Infosys for the 2024-25 financial year rise to a cool £15.1 million if approved by the firm's AGM next month. Her stake in the family firm is reported as comprising 1.1% of the business as at the end of March this year, with her 40,783,162 shares worth around £566 million. The pair will no doubt keep a keen eye on the Sunday Times Rich List, which last year calculated their joint worth at £651 million, when it is published this weekend. Could this be the year Sunak can finally run to an umbrella?
New Statesman
13-05-2025
- Politics
- New Statesman
Labour's immigration rhetoric has outflanked the Tories
Photo by Justin Tallis -It's been eight and a half years since Theresa May declared 'If you believe you are a citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere,' sign-posting the Conservatives' post-Brexit priority of bringing down immigration levels. Echoes of the citizens of nowhere rhetoric – turbocharged – could be heard in yesterday's warning by Keir Starmer that 'we risk becoming an island of strangers', as the Prime Minister gave a speech setting out the measures his government will take to tackle a challenge that consumed and ultimately destroyed the Tories for almost a decade. That line has proved a lightning rod for criticism of the government's immigration agenda on the left. Zarah Sultana, who sits as an independent MP after having the Labour whip suspended in July, accused Starmer of 'imitating Enoch Powell's 'Rivers of Blood' speech'. Left-wing Labour backbencher Nadia Whittome called it 'shameful and dangerous', arguing it 'mimics the scaremongering of the far-right'. It seems perhaps Starmer (or his team) did not realise quite how that phrase would sound when the speech was written. Yet less bombastically antagonistic but even more hardline is Starmer's introduction to the White Paper itself. 'Britain became a one-nation experiment in open borders' under the last government, he writes, repeating a line he has often used when taunting the Tories. But he continues: 'The damage this has done to our country is incalculable.' It's hard to imagine Rishi Sunak categorising the damage done to the UK by uncontrolled immigration as 'incalculable'. The furthest the former PM would go was to say legal immigration was 'too high' and to try to change the subject to illegal immigration and Rwanda. This is mostly down to the awkward fact that the huge spike in net migration – surpassing 900,000 in 2023 – came as a direct result of the post-Brexit shakeup overseen by a Conservative Prime Minister. Boris Johnson's points-based system was supposed to 'take back control' of immigration. And arguably it did so, in the sense that the hundreds of thousands of visas granted as a result of that system were controlled by government departments. But if control was meant to also lead to a reduction in numbers, the points-based system was one of the most dramatic Conservative failures. Hence Sunak's impossible tightrope, trying to signal how 'tough' he was on the issue without drawing too much attention to the mess (in Tory terms) his predecessor had made. This quandary does not just apply to rhetoric. When Sunak tried to show he was grasping the (legal) immigration nettle, the measures he came up with included increasing the earnings threshold for people wanting to bring overseas spouses and dependents to Britain and restricting the graduate visa route (which didn't actually happen). Though they caused outrage at the time, they are nothing in comparison to the sweeping measures in this week's 76-page White Paper – most notably, scrapping the social care visa altogether and increasing the length of time someone has to be a resident in Britain to qualify for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR). Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe The latter is particularly interesting. Back in February, I wrote about the Tories 'Boriswave' problem: the panic in Conservative circles that the influx of people who came to the UK as a result of Johnson's points-based system would soon be eligible for ILR. Kemi Badenoch's first (and so far only) policy since becoming leader was to double residency requirements from five to ten years – as Starmer is now doing. Back then, Tories around Badenoch were hopeful that, if Labour adopted these changes too, they could use it as proof that, while Nigel Farage and Reform were wasting time grandstanding, they were getting actual results in opposition. But at the same time, other Conservative factions were grumbling about the missed opportunity. Why was Badenoch proposing something in opposition which Sunak could have enacted in government? Those grumbles are back again this week. While the public message from the Conservative camp is that the government's measures don't go far enough and that Starmer should commit to a hard cap on numbers, and potentially leaving the ECHR as well, privately a sense of 'why didn't we do this?' prevails. It's not the first time Tories – both MPs relegated to opposition and those who lost their seats in July – have been caught off-guard by the Labour government's willingness to take radical steps many Conservatives supported but considered impossible when they were in office. See also: scrapping NHS England and slashing the international aid budget to bolster defence spending. There are, of course, good reasons the Tories were wary on immigration reform that have nothing to do with Boris Johnson – and more to do with the Treasury. The measures Starmer announced on Monday come with trade-offs: in terms of economic stability (already the CBI and other business groups are issuing dire warnings, especially regarding universities), public services (it's difficult to see how the care sector can survive the changes without significantly increasing salaries, which risks bankrupting local councils), and political capital. The tough truth is that public perception on immigration levels doesn't necessarily match up with reality. Immigration is already down by a third in 2024, but you wouldn't know it from the intel coming out of focus groups and polls. There is a risk, as I wrote last month, that Starmer walks into the same trap Sunak did of increasing public awareness of something on which the government will never be able to satisfy voters. But it's interesting nonetheless to watch a Labour government go further than successive Tory ones ever felt able to. Perhaps it's a matter of desperation, with Labour more afraid of the Farage threat than the costs of what it's proposing. Perhaps Starmer has underestimated the potential backlash, as May failed to realise how the 'citizens of nowhere' line would haunt her premiership. Regardless, there is willingness to be radical – some might even say reckless – in this government that was lacking from the last. And the Tories know it. This piece first appeared in the Morning Call newsletter; receive it every morning by subscribing on Substack here [See also: Rachel Reeves shouldn't U-turn on winter fuel cuts] Related
India Gazette
12-05-2025
- Sport
- India Gazette
"A legend of the game": Former UK PM Sunak pays tribute to Virat Kohli after Test retirement
London [UK], May 12 (ANI): As the cricketing world comes to terms with the end of an era following Virat Kohli's retirement from Test cricket, tributes have poured in from across the globe, not just from players, pundits and fans, but even from the corridors of political power. Among the many voices acknowledging Kohli's immense contribution to the game was former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who took to X to express his admiration for the Indian cricketing icon. 'Sad we won't get to see @imVkohli one last time this summer. He has been a legend of the game: a superb batsman, an astute captain and a formidable competitor who always understood the true value of Test cricket,' Sunak said. Kohli, who announced his retirement from the longest format on Monday, has enjoyed a storied Test career spanning over a decade. With 9,230 runs in 123 matches, including 30 centuries, the Delhi-born cricketer not only redefined fitness and intensity in Indian cricket but also reignited passion for Test cricket in an era increasingly dominated by white-ball formats. Sunak's message reflects the deep impact Kohli has had, not just in India but also in England, a country where he shared an intense and memorable on-field rivalry with the likes of James Anderson and Stuart Broad. His gritty hundred at Edgbaston in 2018 remains one of his most celebrated innings and was widely credited with changing his fortunes in English conditions. Known for his aggression, charisma, and ability to lead by example, Kohli leaves behind a legacy that is etched into the history of Indian and world cricket. Virat will not play any part in the upcoming England series, which is scheduled from June 20. (ANI)
