St John’s in Manchester is fast cementing its reputation as a growing media industry hub in the city after announcing McCann as its latest signing.

Department’s Bonded Warehouse is already home to leading global agencies, including Dentsu, Weber Shandwick and Grayling.

This month, Department will welcome its latest high profile signing – globally renowned advertising agency, McCann.

Open Partners, one of the UK’s biggest and fastest-growing fully independent agencies, is now in its fourth year at Bonded Warehouse.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Live from Lisbon, Manchester City CTO Greg Swimer and VTEX chief revenue officer Santiago Naranjo discussed how technology is transforming the fan experience through their new global partnership.

Swimer said the collaboration, announced eight months ago, reflects shared values of innovation, collaboration and expertise, as City expands its digital and physical footprint with new developments around the Etihad.

Among these are the recently announced virtual stadium tour, which gives fans first-hand experience of stepping out onto the pitch.

Naranjo praised the club’s – and Swimer’s- “commitment to putting fans at the centre,” and explained how VTEX’s platform will help to create personalised online journeys for supporters worldwide.

4Imprint – +17.18%
Oxford Instruments – +12.72%
Vodafone – +5.38%
Watches of Switzerland – +5.28%
WPP – +4.39%

Other big risers from the tech space are Kainos (+3.22%), Trainline (+2.13%), BT Group (+1.72%), Sage (+1.50%) and Rightmove (+1.49%).

Hilton Food Group – -22.31%
Ceres Power – -4.08%
Tesco – -3.28%
Marks & Spencer – -3.05%
Ashmore Group – -2.87%

Tech firms which have also dropped today are Auto Trader (-2.42%), BAE Systems (-1.15%), Pinewood Technologies (-1.13%) and Plus500 (-1%).

MediaCity Immersive Technologies Innovation Hub (MITIH) has partnered with Grow with Google to deliver a free new workshop series helping Greater Manchester’s entrepreneurs unlock the practical potential of AI for business growth.

Based at HOST, the Home for Skills & Technology in MediaCity – and open to all – attendees can choose to take part in any of the interactive workshops, including Making Sense of AI, Practical AI for Business, Social Media Masterclass, AI Prompting Essentials, and Leadership for the Digital Age.

Delivered by MITIH as part of its Spark Salford accelerator programme, it brings together entrepreneurs, small business owners, and creative professionals for hands-on learning. Participants will gain actionable insights into using AI tools to streamline operations, boost productivity, and strengthen digital strategies.

Lifted Ventures won the ‘Investing in Women: Initiative of the Year’ award at the Growth Investor Awards 2025.

It was recognised for empowering women founders and building regional investment ecosystems outside London.

The Growth Investor Awards, organised by Intelligent Partnership, took place at the London Hilton on Park Lane on Thursday 6th November.

Other finalists in the category were Angel Academe, Conduit Connect, NoBa Capital and Revenge Capital.

The award was presented by TV presenter Alex Jones and Natalie Gasson-McKinley MBE, senior manager, policy and strategy at the British Business Bank.

Liverpool-based MedTech innovator Enteral Access Technologies Ltd (EAT) has secured £500,000 in a bridging round led by British Design Fund for its patient safety device.

The round also saw continued support from existing investors, with the funding intended to contribute to EAT’s work in advancing patient safety through innovation in enteral access.

The company’s flagship product, DoubleCHEK, is a device designed to prevent misplacement of nasogastric feeding tubes, a persistent and dangerous issue in clinical settings and one of the most frequently reported Never Events in the NHS – serious, preventable incidents that should not occur when proper safety procedures are followed.

DoubleCHEK’s CO₂ indicator helps flag accidental lung placement by detecting carbon dioxide, which is an indication that the nasogastric tube is in the airway and not the esophagus, and should be removed prior to full insertion. When there is no indication of CO2, the tube can be fully inserted to the stomach where DoubleCHEK’s pH indicator can then confirm the acidic environment of the stomach. This combined approach provides a fast, reliable, and easy-to-interpret bedside check, reducing reliance on X-rays and subjective interpretation, and aligning with emerging NHS safety guidance.

The company was founded by George Gallagher, an electrical engineer and seasoned entrepreneur who recognised the scale of the challenge with misplaced nasogastric feeding tubes – a treatment he himself needed as a child.

Customer service provider Moneypenny has launched two new services, Payment Taking and Appointment Booking, that complete high-intent customer calls in the moment.

The products remove the need for handovers and follow-ups which slow companies down.

The Appointment Booking service allows Moneypenny PAs to schedule, rearrange or cancel appointments during a call, updating calendars or booking platforms instantly. For Payment Taking, trained PAs process deposits, balances, invoices or gift vouchers on the spot.

Starling Bank has teamed up with Small Business Britain to found a campaign to empower women across the UK to start and grow their businesses.

Launching in early 2026, the new partnership will feature a free training programme – ‘Female Founder Fundamentals: the definitive guide to starting and growing your business’ – comprising online masterclasses and peer-learning opportunities focused on building confidence, growth and financial skills.

The programme will also support mental resilience, financial wellbeing and community connection after joint research found that 60% of female founders struggle to switch off from work.

Permutable AI, a UK-based FinTech using vertical large language models to deliver real-time, explainable intelligence for institutional markets, has announced a major expansion of its global partnerships programme.

This initiative marks the next phase in its scale-up journey, extending its adaptive, reasoning-based AI systems into leading financial, commodities, and energy platforms worldwide.

Unlike generic LLMs, Permutable’s vertical architecture continuously learns from evolving market, sentiment, macro and geopolitical data – enabling financial institutions to anticipate, not just react to, market change.

Pulse Finance has appointed Rachael Burling as business development manager, reinforcing its commitment to supporting the funding needs of UK SMEs.

Burling will be responsible for expanding Pulse Finance’s reach within the UK market, increasing firms’ access to flexible finance solutions.

She brings over a decade of experience working within the Australian financial services sector and joins Pulse Finance from Spenda, a business platform that acts as both a software solutions provider and a payment processor.

Author: Chris Maguire

What links Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett, TikTok sensation Khaby Lame and a first-team scout at Serie A side Como 1907?

The answer is they’re all part of a growing number of content creators.

Last month Diary Of A CEO host Steven Bartlett told me in an exclusive interview how he wants to be the ‘Disney of the creator economy’.

The 33-year-old’s new company – Steven.com – has just closed a major eight-figure investment in a deal that valued the business at an impressive $425m (£320m).

In simply terms, Bartlett wants to be at the heart of creator economy – and it’s easy to see why.

Last night I attended the launch event for this year’s Web Summit in Lisbon, where the name on everyone’s lips at a packed MEO Arena was Khaby Lame.

The 25-year-old’s wordless comedy has made him the most-followed creator on TikTok with 161 million followers and another 79 million followers on Instagram.

If you’ve heard of Steven Bartlett and Khaby Lame, the odds are you haven’t heard of Felix Johnston.

The 20-year-old has been making headlines of his own after Serie A side Como hired him as a first-team coach.

What makes his story remarkable is that, until recently he was a content creator for Chelsea on the social media platform X, highlighting the academy’s brightest young academy stars.

 

The unemployment rate in the UK has risen to 5% in the three months to September – its highest level since COVID – after payrolled workers fell by 32,000 in September.

The Office for National Statistics said the figures – slightly above the projected figure of 4.9% projected by analysts ahead of this month’s Budget – were a sign that the jobs market has weakened.

Average wage growth was 4.6% , down from 4.7% in the previous three months.

Liz McKeown, director of economic statistics for the ONS, said: “Taken together, these figures point to a weakening labour market. The number of job vacancies, however, remains broadly unchanged.”

HSBC Holdings plc has appointed Wei Sun Christianson, aged 69, as an independent non-executive director.

She brings extensive banking and regulatory experience gained over a 30-year international career, having most recently served as a senior advisor at Morgan Stanley, a role she assumed following her retirement from Morgan Stanley in 2022.

Christianson’s final executive role at Morgan Stanley was Co-CEO, Asia Pacific and she also served as CEO, Morgan Stanley China from 2006 to 2022.

Prior to Morgan Stanley, she held senior regulatory roles at the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission, where she was involved in the drafting of the regulatory structure that would enable Chinese companies to be listed outside the country. 

Princes Group has reported a 51.5% leap in EBITDA to £111.1m for the nine months ended 30th September 2025.

Reporting its first results since listing, the Liverpool-headquartered food group however said topline performance ‘reflects the deflationary environment’. Revenue was £1.4bn, down from £1.5bn in the previous year.

Underlying free cash flow was £136.5m, which it said reflects sustained working capital discipline and supplier management.

Altitude Group plc, another provider of branded merchandise, has seen revenue grow 17.5% to $21.6 million for the six months ended 30th September 2025. Adjusted EBITDA increased 6% to $1.7m.

It said the results reflect the first contribution from the seven University Gear Shop contracts awarded last year. UGS now operates 29 programmes across 47 campus locations.

To support the group through the next phase of its growth, Martin Varley, a non-executive director, has been appointed chief strategy officer. The search for a new NED is underway.

Tap Global Group plc has reported record revenues in the first quarter of the year.

Described as a digital finance hub that brings money payments and crypto settlement services together in a single app, Tap Global said unaudited revenues for the period are expected to be £991,000, representing year-on-year growth of 40.3% compared to the prior year period.

The firm has a user base of 390,000 people and has now launched a B2B product, Bitcoin Treasury as a Service, which was piloted during the period. The BTaaS platform is an institutional-grade solution designed for publicly listed companies adopting Bitcoin as a primary treasury reserve asset, providing them with global liquidity, fiat-to-crypto conversion and reporting.

4imprint Group plc says it has delivered a ‘resilient operational and financial performance against the backdrop of volatile macroeconomic conditions’.

The personalised merchandise firm said it expects to report full-year revenue of not less than $1.32bn, which is at the high end of the current analyst forecast range, and profit before tax of not less than $142m, which is above the upper end of the current analyst forecast range. 

Group revenue for the first 10 months of 2025 was 2% below the same period in 2024. Order intake has continued to run approximately 3% below prior year with average order values in line with prior year, as the business has traded resiliently through its peak seasonal months. 

Gross profit margin has remained just below 33%, as product cost increases due to tariffs are ‘being phased in later than anticipated’.

The group had a cash balance of $124m at the end of October 2025.

Vodafone Group Plc has reported its half-year results and launched a €500m share buyback.

In H1 FY26 revenues increased by 7.3% to €19.6 billion, while adjusted EBITDAaL increased by 5.9% to €5.7bn.

However operating profit decreased by 9.2% to €2.2bn.

The latest tranche of share buybacks follows the €3bn already completed since May 2024, with a further €1bn planned.

Vodafone’s full-year FY26 guidance is now that it will deliver at the upper end of its ranges: adjusted EBITDAaL of €11.3-11.6bn and adjusted free cash flow of €2.4-2.6bn.

Author: Chris Maguire

The boss of £1.2bn turnover technology giant Travel Counsellors has said AI can be used to their advantage.

Steve Bryne told the company’s three-day conference at the ACC Liverpool, that AI can enhance storytelling.

More than 1,500 people attended the event from November 7-9  and Bryne said Travel Counsellors was well placed as a company  to ride the technology wave.

“There’s a transformation in the way that people either buy or provide services and we need to turn it to our advantage,” he told BusinessCloud.

“In our world we know what our brand stands for and that’s personalisation and care for customers so how can we use that to enhance that personalisation and care?”

Author: Chris Maguire

Web Summit founder and CEO Paddy Cosgrave has identified China as leading the new technological era.

Speaking at last night’s launch event for the 2025 Web Summit in Lisbon he said: “In the coming days, you will find the world’s most advanced humanoid robots on the Web Summit floor. They won’t be European, they won’t be American. Instead, they are Chinese.”

Cosgrave said he hoped the 2025 Web Summit would produce a future Revolut, which exhibited 10 years ago when they were a three-person startup.

He said although there had been a decline in the number of Germany tech firms at this year’s Web Summit, he said the new ‘poster child’ Poland had a record representation.

“I think we have never lived in a more exciting moment,” he said.