Business News

A commercial law firm has announced the arrival of a new Director who has joined, based within the Dispute Management department. Arif Khalfe joins Yorkshire-based Lupton Fawcett with experience in a wide range of litigated areas including Professional Negligence, Contentious Trusts and Probate as well as Consumer Litigation. His also has a keen interest in all aspects of alternative dispute resolution and is a qualified mediator.

He also has specialist expertise within Immigration; advising and assisting in all aspects of business and sports immigration which includes advising on sponsorships and visas under the points based systems. As well as that, Arif also advises clients on applying for sponsor's licenses from the Home Office and complying with their sponsorship obligations once they are licensed. He also assists in managing and advising on sponsorship management systems.

Richard Marshall, Managing Director, comments: “Arif is very well-respected and passionate about wanting to help businesses and individuals alike. He’s a fantastic appointment for the firm and adds real strength to what is already a very well respected team. Clearly Brexit will put immigration onto many employers’ agenda as international recruitment becomes more complex. His expertise will help and guide clients through the immigration process and any issues they may face.

Khalfe comments: “I am delighted to be joining Lupton Fawcett to establish a leading Immigration offering that is commercially beneficial to clients and their workforces.  I am also excited to be part of a firm that has a clear strategy to meet our future challenges and I look forward to reinforcing the reputation that the firm already has in the Yorkshire market consisting of Leeds, Sheffield and York."

Three iconic brands will be joining the line-up at the region’s most visited shopping centre, Bullring. Luxury brands Coach and Russell & Bromley will open stores on the Upper East Mall alongside the likes of Michael Kors, Whistles, Ted Baker and Diesel, whilst Ben Sherman joins the line-up at the recently developed LinkStreet mall.

Coach, the leading New York design house of modern luxury accessories for women and men, will open its first standalone store in the region. The 280sq m space will offer the brand’s full range of bags, footwear, outerwear and accessories.

British footwear brand, Russell & Bromley, will join Coach on the centre’s Upper East Mall when they both open later in the year, in a 260sq m store.

The iconic Ben Sherman brand is set to open on 10^th April in a 164sq m store on the LinkStreet mall area, which is located on the walkway between Bullring and Grand Central. Offering its full range of menswear collections including shoes and accessories, the store joins the likes of Luke 1977 and Pretty Green in taking a unit at LinkStreet. Other brands to join the new revamped mall space include the hugely popular restaurants, Not Dogs and Cereal Killer Café.

Michaela Moore, General Manager at Bullring, commented: “It’s fantastic news not just for Bullring but for the city that these three stand-out brands have decided to have a presence in Birmingham. All three brands follow Smashbox, T2 and New Look Men in choosing the centre to open their first standalone stores in the region.”

A former social worker from Birmingham, who launched a line of musical jewellery boxes featuring black ballerinas, is achieving huge exporting success – thanks to Department for International Trade (DIT) experts.

Sharon McBean, who lives in Birmingham, launched Nia Ballerina in August last year and received so many orders from the USA in the run up to Christmas that she had to enlist the help of a fulfilment house in Virginia, USA, to cope with demand.

After meeting Cheryl Boxall, an International Trade Adviser in DIT’s Birmingham office, at a trade show last year, Sharon has taken advantage of exporting support provided by the Department to ensure she is fully equipped with the necessary resources for overseas trading. DIT support included advice on protecting Nia Ballerina intellectual property, internationalising the website and launching a global e-commerce website.

“The fact that Nia Ballerina has experienced such rapid success, particularly in the USA, demonstrates that she has tapped into a gap in the market. DIT has been helping the company from the very beginning and we have continued to offer support as Sharon looks to expand more strategically into new markets. Issues such as intellectual property are crucial in business and this has been an important part of her export experience so far," Cheryl said.

Sharon came up with the idea for the jewellery boxes after failing to find one for her ballet-mad five-year-old daughter.

Realising there was a business opportunity, she hired an illustrator to design two images for the musical jewellery boxes and ordered black ballerina figurines to go inside them.

Following her initial success, which included selling more than 1000 boxes to US buyers in just a few weeks during the Christmas period, Sharon is now in the process of designing new jewellery boxes and creating new lines to complement them. She has also collaborated with US-based organisation Brown Girls Do Ballet.

Sharon said: “The past few months have been absolutely overwhelming. I never imagined that these jewellery boxes would become so popular so quickly. They have proved a major success in the USA in particular, accounting for about 80% of sales over the Christmas period. I'm looking to see how we can continue growing sales there, building on the success we've has thus far. I’m grateful to Cheryl and the team at DIT because without that support I'm not sure I would have been able to prepare my business for overseas trading so quickly. I'll continue working with DIT and plan to tap into African markets such as Ghana and South Africa next."

The co-founder and CEO of award-winning international games label Team17 Debbie Bestwick MBE will be delivering the keynote at this year’s Games Finance Market.

The industry veteran and pioneer will be sharing the lessons she has learned on the path to Team17 becoming the biggest UK games publisher, including how to scale a small company and attract investment with over 150 delegates assembled for the Games Finance Market.

Bestwick co-founded Team17 in 1990 having previously worked in video games indie retail. She launched the multi-award winning Worms in the mid ’90s, a franchise that has sold/downloaded over 75m units since. She helped move the developer into self-publishing on mobile and digital downloads in the early 2000s, completed a MBO of the company in 2011 and launched Team17’s games Label in 2013 making Team17 one of the prolific indie labels in Europe.

In 2016, she was made an MBE for her services to the computer games industry and helped secure £16.5m in investment for Team17.

The Games Finance Market runs from Wednesday 5 April to Thursday 6 April and takes place at The Grange Tower Bridge. The event will see investors and publishers meeting with games developers; there is over £500m in potential investment at the Market.

“Made in Germany” is the most highly regarded quality label for goods and services around the world, outshining other major exporting nations’ trust marks such as “Made in USA” or “Made in UK”. This is one of the findings from Statista’s Made-In-Country Index (MICI).

Statista, one of the world’s leading databases for business-relevant facts and information, sought to find out which countries around the globe enjoy the best reputation as countries of manufacture and exporting nations. Statista therefore surveyed some 43,000 consumers in 52 countries about countries’ quality labels. The result is the Made-In-Country Index 2017 – a global ranking of countries and an indicator of the power of the individual nations’ brand image.

Here are the results: “Made in Germany” takes prime position and is therefore the world’s leading quality label. The label’s first-place position is mainly due to positive ratings in the product categories “quality” and “security standards” along with the overall popularity of “Made in Germany” across many countries in the world. Switzerland is in second place and received very high ratings from around the world in the categories “status symbol” and “authenticity”. Italy excels with regard to design, while Japan received the best “advanced technology” ratings of all countries. China outshines others regarding “price/performance ratio”.

The USA just scrapes into the Top 10: All in all, the USA ranks eighth and is thus behind countries such as Great Britain, Sweden, and Canada. The United States is furthermore among those countries, whose global reputations have worsened the most over the course of the past twelve months, suggesting a ‘Trump effect’. But the USA is not the only example of the fact that major political changes do have a noticeable effect on the image of certain countries of manufacture. Turkey’s and Greece’s scores are also linked to recent political developments that damaged both countries’ reputations.

The bronze medal is taken by the “Made in EU” label, which was established as late as in 2003 by the EU commission. The label primarily owes its positive reputation to consistently high global ratings. Thus, not only consumers from European Community countries such as, for instance, Sweden and Great Britain, have faith in the label, but also respondents from outside the EU. For example, “Made in EU” took top places in almost all South American countries (e.g. Argentina and Colombia).

The Phoenix Newspaper will, again, be showing its international ‘pull’ when it will be part of a major African exhibition attracting some of the continents – and worlds – biggest established businesses.

Bringing together a wide array of companies, nationally and internationally, Southwest Investment Exhibition & Summit (SWIFT), running for a 4th year, will again be looking to attract foreign investors to southwest Nigeria, in particular, and the country, as a whole, targeting corporate and small-to-medium concerns by exhibiting their products, create new markets, meet funders and funding organisation, see new inventions, and have the opportunity to network with government officials whilst adding value and profit to their business.

With a goal of improving the gross domestic product of the region, the two day event - May 2-3 – will be looking to continue create newer technological transformation, further create employment opportunities and government internally generated revenue. And The Phoenix Newspaper will be major media partners, lending its considerably global attraction, making sure no-one misses out.

The exhibition, at the Landmark Centre, in Lagos, has already attracted enormous international interest, with exhibitors from as far and wide as the Americas, Europe, Asia, as well as throughout the African continent.

In the UK there’s great anticipation for the event, especially thanks, in no uncertain way, to Birmingham-based international trade developer, Kunle Aderemi.

C.E.O. of FODION (Foreign Direct Investment Drive) Consultants Limited, Kunle’s passion for the upcoming exhibition is unwavering, which is understandable.

A Lagos native and co organizer of the event, in partnership with DAWN (Development Agenda for Western Nigeria), he knows only too well the power of the Southwest Investment Exhibition & Summit.

“Expecting some 2000plus visitors, SWIFT will, as always, add great value to south west Nigeria. It will attract His Imperial Majesty the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, Nigeria Vice President Professor Yemi Osibajo, Minister for Trade & Investment, Professor Okechwukwu Enelamah as guests, in addition to the six Southwest Nigeria State Governors.”

Southwest Investment Exhibition & Summit 2017 will then end with a Networking Dinner. And, The Phoenix Newspaper will be there to cover every second.

A major push for businesses to explore markets outside the EU has been launched by Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce (GBCC). And a prime target for the European Commission-funded initiative will be the US, with UK companies being urged to attend the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in January.

In a move designed to help small and medium-sized businesses in Europe to go global, the newly-launched Ready2Go programme will provide financial assistance for a limited number of UK companies and they must apply by 31 March.

The initiative, which will also focus on Canada, Chile, India and Cameroon, is backed by the International Business Hub at GBCC.

Companies taking part in this exclusive programme will undergo the development of a bespoke “internationalisation” business plan; a three-day individual training and coaching programme, including advice about the culture and customs in each country; two-day collective training; and pre-arranged meetings in their chosen countries.

It is open to companies from multiple sectors, including agro-food, creative industries, environment, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, ICT, intelligent energy, key enabling technologies, material, nano and micro-technologies, retail and services, sustainable construction, textile and fashion wood and furniture.

The USA opportunity will include support to prepare for the CES, which for 50 years has been the launch pad for innovation and technology that has changed the world.

Held in Las Vegas every year, it is the world’s gathering place for all who thrive on the business of consumer technologies and where next-generation innovations are introduced to the marketplace.

Rupi Nandra, head of international programmes for the GBCC’s International Hub, said: “This EC project had been developed by a consortium led by the Milan Chamber in collaboration with the Enterprise Europe Network. “Ready2Go is a new programme designed to give SMEs the necessary tools for success abroad.

“In today’s world the international marketplace is no longer reserved for big corporations and it’s vital that SMEs step in, especially in the light of Brexit and the changing political climate in the US.

“But setting up shop abroad is not easy, which is why Ready2Go is looking to help dynamic SMEs in Europe to successfully go global.

“We would strongly encourage businesses in the West Midlands and across the UK who are interested in joining the Ready2Go programme to register early because only 80 companies from all over Europe will be selected to take part.”

Sunny Claire, business advisor, Enterprise Europe Network, adds: “The CES event in Las Vegas is a tremendous opportunity to see the latest electronic technology in one of the biggest exhibitions of its kind. Delegates get the opportunity to tap into this global market, in many ways, including investment, selling or distribution.

“We urge businesses in the Greater Birmingham region who are interested in joining the  Ready2Go programme to register early because only 80 companies from all over Europe will be selected to take part.”

Severn Trent is working hard to protect its customers by fighting fat! The company has been removing tonnes of fat from the sewers to help prevent flooding in customer’s homes and businesses. Aaron McCusker, senior network technician for Severn Trent, says: “Fat and grease are good for lots of things, but one thing they’re definitely not good for is our sewers. “When poured down the sink, they quickly solidify and cause blockages in the pipes, which are a lot smaller than people might imagine, and this can lead to the nightmare that is sewer flooding for you or your neighbours.”

Following his much published intervention on the issue of a pupil at local primary school being prohibited from wearing an Islamic hijab headscarf, Birmingham City Council’s Councillor Waseem Zaffar has resigned from his cabinet post. The resignation of Cllr Zaffar, Labour councillor for Lozells and East Handsworth, shortly after the news of the departure of Council chief executive, Mark Rogers.

Kapil Mishra, Tourism Minister of Delhi in India, has stressed the need and importance of the government and the industry to work together to boost tourism. Mishra spoke at the Travel and Tourism Fair (TTF) 2017, in New Delhi on February 27 at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium. TTF is India’s largest travel trade show network.

Birmingham Airport is set to welcome another new carrier in June 2017, offering a brand new route to, the capital of Eastern Europe's Republic of Moldova. New scheduled airline, Fly One, will operate three times a week from Birmingham, using an Airbus A319 with 144 seats each Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

Propertymark, a brand new stamp of approval for the property market, has been launched by two of the industry’s regulatory bodies. The Association of Residential Letting Agents (ARLA) and the National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA) have joined forces to create the new certification, which will replace the National Federation of Property Professionals brand.

Politicians, businessmen and women, local leaders and prominent community figures were all in attendance last night at the Birmingham Conference & Events Centre for a Dinner with Andy Street. The former Managing Director of John Lewis was the man of the moment as he set out his stall as the Conservative candidate for West Midlands Mayor for the upcoming election, due to take place on May 4th.

Businesses from every sector across Birmingham have united in support of this summer’s big free art event – The Big Sleuth. From travel and hospitality to education and professional services, the best of Birmingham has pledged its support for the highly-anticipated sequel to The Big Hoot, which attracted more than 800,000 visitors in 2015 and raised over £625,000 in total for Birmingham Children’s Hospital Charity.

Award-winning UK bus operator, Arriva, has chosen Corethree to develop its latest mobile ticketing application in response to customer demand and to create a quicker, safer and easier method of payment when purchasing bus tickets. With new payment solutions such as Apple Pay, Android Pay and PayPal, the technology was developed by leading mobile ticketing solutions provider, Corethree and allows passengers to select from a wide range of ticket options including Day, Weekly, 4-Weekly and Annual Saver tickets and pay through the application, eradicating the need for cash and loose change.

Professionals who overclaim on their business expenses could be costing the UK economy a massive £1.6bn a year, that’s according to a new report from Britain’s largest provider of fuel card solutions, Allstar Business Solutions. The study, which questioned 1,000 working professionals, revealed that 36% of drivers have overclaimed mileage and 17% of employees deliberately overclaim on all of their business expenses each month, whilst a further 41% felt there wasn’t anything wrong with doing so, despite it being illegal.