Industry news

Debenhams has announced it is helping to boost the economy by ramping up its use of British manufacturers.

The retailer is calling on UK suppliers to proactively get in touch so that it can bolster its domestic production, in a move that will help revitalise the UK clothing industry.

Debenhams will stock more clothing and homeware made exclusively in the UK – with a Union Jack label displayed prominently to emphasise the origin and a new bespoke brand, called “Made by Great Britons”.

Debenhams already has a strong history of working with the best British designers, with its infamous ‘Designers at Debenhams’ range including well-known names like Julien Macdonald, Henry Holland, Jenny Packham, Matthew Williamson and Jasper Conran.

Said Debenhams’ Group Trading director Suzanne Harlow: “The fantastic support for the Jubilee and the Olympics this year shows how passionate we all are about championing the best of British.

“We have some of the best clothing manufacturers in the world, and we want to see their products in our stores. As we’re proud of where they’re produced, our new brand will appear on anything we source from the UK.

Rolls-Royce has said that it is in talks with the Serious Fraud Office over possible bribery and corruption.

"It is too early to predict the outcomes, but these could include the prosecution of individuals and of the company," the British firm said.

The aircraft engine manufacturer said it had passed on information about alleged malpractice by intermediaries.

The "intermediaries" involved are local companies that provide sales and distribution, and repair and maintenance services for Rolls-Royce in countries in which the UK firm does not have enough of its own people on the ground.

Atos has been awarded a contract to provide cloud services to the Government's Insolvency Service, in a five-year contract worth £16 million.

The contract was procured under the Cabinet Office’s Desktop 21 framework agreement, designed to provide pricing for the public sector for end user services.

Mark Savigar of the Insolvency Service said: “Atos proposed a solution that meets our business needs and we believe will support us in meeting our organisational objectives for the future.”

New deal will see greater focus on innovation and the closer alignment of application management to business outcomes.

Today, Steria, a leading provider of IT-enabled business services, announces that it has extended its 10 year strategic partnership with the pharmacy-led health and beauty retailer, Boots UK. Under the new three year deal, plus an optional two year extension, Steria will provide application management for around 350 business critical applications, resulting in a more efficient, enhanced service, with identified cost savings and higher levels of performance.

The applications to be managed by Steria under the new agreement underpin Boots UK operations in retail and healthcare, plus many of the business critical support office functions such as HR, along with desktop and legacy applications. The solution will provide an application support service which is more closely aligned to Boots UK’s changing business needs.

The renewed relationship establishes a new platform for continuous improvement where Steria will work collaboratively with Boots UK and its other IT suppliers to identify ongoing efficiencies and cost savings, which will in turn enhance the customer experience and loyalty.

Cisco Systems has undertaken a expansion programme over the coming years, aimed at increasing its market role in connectivity software and devices.

Cisco will move to develop its managed services and consulting business aimed at analysing business problems.

Chief Technology and Strategy Officer Padmasree Warrior said: "We're going to be very selective. We leverage our intellectual property to create value for our partners in services".

Capita have been awarded a ten-year contract to provide outsourced BPO services to Barnet Council, including customer service and support services.

The deal is expected to reduce overall costs with expected savings of £125.4 million over a decade.

Barnet Council leader Richard Cornelius said: "The bottom line is that this will give us £120m to spend on public services in Barnet that we would not otherwise have”.

The outsourcing of services has attracted controversy in regard to the loss of council jobs with a predicted loss of 180 jobs over the course of the contract.

Two UK banks are to face fines of over $2 billion in the US over money laundering and breaking sanctions.

HSBC and Standard Chartered are both likely to pay hundreds of millions to settle US charges. HSBC is facing charges stemming from money laundering charges while Standard Chartered is facing action due to links with Iran.

Despite initial stock falls both banks have seen growth despite the US charges.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has announced plans to bring the manufacturing of the next line of Macs to the US along with the design in 2013.

The next line of Mac computers will see around $62 million in investment, a small fraction of total Apple manufacturing spend.

Mr Cook said in an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek that: "Next year we're going to bring some production to the US," adding that, “This doesn't mean that Apple will do it ourselves, but we'll be working with people and we'll be investing our money."

David Cameron has announced further investment for Tech City totalling £50 million to develop Old Street roundabout adding space for future start-ups.

The investment will include the creation of a civic centre including classrooms, workshop space and printing facilities in addition to super-fast broadband infrastructure.

Cameron said in a statement: “"As well as backing the businesses of today, we are creating an aspiration nation and also backing the innovative, high-growth businesses of the future".

The government has announced that Virgin Rail will continue to operate the west coast rail line for a further two more years.

The short-term contract had been discussed and expected after the failure of the west coast procurement process in October.

The new contract will see the use of new carriages with greater numbers of seats and a new service between Glasgow and London.