Search Results for: cities

January 16, 2017

UK CEOs bullish on business growth but concerned about skills and global economy ⁰

UK CEOs are more upbeat about the growth prospects for their own companies than 12 months ago, according to PwC’s 20th annual CEO Survey published today at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Almost nine out of 10 (89 percent) respondents say they are confident of their company’s growth in the year ahead, up from 85 percent in 2016, and above the 85 percent global figure and 77 percent in Germany. Forty one percent of UK CEOs describe themselves as being ‘very confident’. More generally, UK bosses are in hiring mode. Sixty three percent expect to grow their workforce over the coming 12 months, compared to 52 percent of their global counterparts. Just 10 percent expect headcount to decrease, down from 20 percent in 2016. Access to key skills is considered to be the single biggest business threat facing their organisations. More than four in five (83 percent) of UK bosses are concerned about how to get hold of key skills, up sharply from 71 percent last year. The skills most highly prized by UK leaders – adaptability and problem solving, leadership and collaboration, and creativity and innovation – are also proving the hardest to recruit.

January 1, 2017

A workplace tale told in numbers: WeWork in 2016 ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Company news, Property

WeWork is the weather vane for a new era in which property is increasingly consumed as a service. The company has issued a statement looking back over its achievements during the past year. It’s a tale told in numbers so makes interesting reading. The firm claims it has added 58 new spaces and now offers over 110 locations open around the world for its 80,000 members. It has opened spaces in 18 new cities including Berlin (Berlin), Beer Sheva, Seoul, Mexico City, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Montreal, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Denver and Sydney. Perhaps most tellingly, it has extended its client reach to include firms such as Microsoft, HSBC, Bacardi and Samsung. There’ll be lots of people offering up lists at this time of year detailing key workplace trends. Few will be as instructive as the numbers coming out of WeWork and the wider coworking movement.

November 24, 2016

Autumn Statement could undermine the growth of London’s tech firms ⁰

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, Legal news, News, Public Sector, Technology

Changes in business rates announced in yesterday’s Autumn Statement are likely to hit hardest the areas in the Capital such as Shoreditch and Fitzrovia where innovative tech companies are located, commented Jon Neale, head of UK Research, JLL. “The impact will no doubt undermine government plans to boost tech investment under its ‘Industrial Strategy’ announced earlier this week,” he said. “Meanwhile, office costs are high in London and post Brexit we need to minimise the risk that companies, will see cheaper continental cities such as Berlin as better bet place to set up shop.” He did add however that the promised “£1.3bn to improve roads and ease congestion is welcome and is likely to unlock development sites and promote economic development in many parts of the country. If the UK is to really address the challenges and opportunities of Brexit, investment in infrastructure needs to be more ambitious as well as more focused on an increasingly digital, hi-tech future. Green and smart city technology, new tram and underground networks and truly high-speed broadband would help provide precisely the platform UK business needs.”

November 23, 2016

UK government announces plans to invest in next generation technology ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Cities, News, Technology

The UK Government is at last to invest properly in the next generation of technological infrastructure to ensure the company keeps pace with developments in broadband, the Internet of Things and 5G. It is to invite the country’s major cities to bid for a chance to pilot 5G from next year. The technology is a key enabler of the Internet of Things (IoT) because it is up to a hundred times faster and more reliable than existing 4G connections. In turn, the IoT will boost the application of game changing technology such as driverless cars and smart building systems. Although the Government has recently focussed on headline physical projects such as HS2, it has come under sustained criticism for the country’s often creaking technological infrastructure.

November 15, 2016

Increased take-up of office space in Manchester as Brexit influences investors ⁰

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

Take-up of prime office space in central Manchester is on course to hit 1 million sq ft in 2016 and could be influenced by the impact of Brexit. The latest research by Colliers International suggests that overseas investors retained an interest in prime Manchester office space partly because of the devaluation of sterling following the Referendum vote for the UK to leave the EU – as proven by the recent £164m acquisition of the 288,000 sq ft One St Peter’s Square by global real estate investor Deka Immobilien. There have been a series of other major deals, including an insurance firm taking 165,000 sq ft of Grade A office scheme, a global law firm moving its global centre into an 80,848 sq ft development; and a government department negotiating a 60,000 sq ft deal. The legal sector accounted for almost 25 percent of total office take-up so far in 2016, followed by media and technology (16 percent) and business services (15 percent). However, all this activity may result in a lack of ready to occupy space in the city by early 2017.

November 9, 2016

Representation of ethnic minorities in UK boardrooms ‘disproportionately low’ ⁰

by Sara Bean • Legal news, News, Workplace

Ethnic minority representation in the Boardrooms across the FTSE 100 and 250 is disproportionately low and does not reflect the ethnic diversity of either the UK or the stakeholders they seek to engage and represent; a new industry-led review has revealed. Given the fact that the UK will be the most diverse country in Western Europe by 2051, with over 30 percent of the population expected to be comprised of people from ethnic minority or migrant backgrounds, each FTSE 100 Board should have at least one director of colour by 2021, and each FTSE 250 Board by 2024. These are the main recommendations of the Parker Review report, Beyond One by ‘21 which found that out of 1,087 director positions in the FTSE 100, only 8 percent of positions are held by directors of colour, of which 1.5 percent are UK citizens, despite the fact that 14 percent of the total UK population is from a non-white ethnic group (up from 2 percent in 1971).

October 31, 2016

Office space sees dip in demand post-Brexit says RICS ⁰

by Sara Bean • Facilities management, News, Property

Demand for office space following the Brexit outcome remains flat according to RICS latest UK Commercial Market Survey 2016; and while the overall UK Commercial property market is showing some signs of a return to a more positive mood post-EU referendum, this has been driven mainly by the industrial sector. London and Scotland are lagging behind the rest of the UK, with Scotland seeing the sharpest drop in headline demand with 24 percent more chartered surveyors seeing a fall during Q3. In the capital, demand fell for the second consecutive quarter with offices seeing the most significant dip (22 percent more respondents reported seeing a fall in demand for London office space). Anecdotal evidence suggests that political uncertainty is still having an effect on both these markets. And the survey also found that respondents from German cities have seen enquiries from UK-based firms and expect there to be an increase in relocation away from Britain over the next two years.

October 28, 2016

Round up: seven things you should read this week ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Features, Flexible working, Technology

Marina Gorbis on our obsession with the non-existent skills gap

Flip Chart Rick on low pay for freelancers and why it matters to everybody

Martin Ford on the risks faced by people who sit in front of a computer – and they’re not physical

McKinsey’s extensive report on the gig economy

Janine Dixon on the disconnect between economic success and wage growth

Huw Price on preparing for the era of machines

Scott Wyatt on how science is transforming cities

October 25, 2016

Nearly a third of investors say Brexit offers commercial real estate investment opps ⁰

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

The recent warning that the major banks are planning to leave the Capital following the Brexit vote has understandably caused some concern within the commercial property sector; so it’s cheering to hear that three in ten (30 percent) institutional investors actually believe Brexit will either increase or significantly increase European commercial real estate investment opportunities. A further one in four (23 percent) institutional investors believe that Brexit will have no impact on commercial real estate investment opportunities. According to a new study by BrickVest, following the UK’s decision to leave the European Union, nearly two in five (38 percent) institutional real estate investors cited London as the top European city to invest in commercial real estate, ahead of Berlin (36 percent), Munich (31 percent) and Paris (22 percent). However, one in five (21 percent) cited both Dublin and Hamburg and a further 16 percent selected Frankfurt, highlighting a clear positive trend towards German commercial real estate. Indeed 40 percent of the top ten European cities were German.

October 24, 2016

Corporate real estate sector continues to make progress in energy consumption, carbon emissions and water use ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Environment, News, Property

The world’s leading corporate real estate owners and managers are making significant progress in reducing energy consumption, carbon emissions and water usage in their buildings, according to a new report from the Urban Land Institute’s (ULI) Greenprint Center for Building Performance. The Greenprint Performance Report, which measures and tracks the performance of more than 5,400 properties owned by Greenprint’s members, demonstrates a 3.4 percent reduction in energy consumption, a 3.9 percent reduction in carbon emissions and a 4.8 percent reduction in water use between 2014 and 2015. According to the study, since Greenprint started recording building performance in 2009, the energy consumed by members’ properties tracked by Greenprint has dropped 13.7 percent. Carbon emissions from those properties have decreased 16.5 percent; and water usage has dropped by 10.6 percent. The reductions occurred even as building occupancy rose, suggesting that greater space usage does not necessarily cause a decline in building performance.

October 18, 2016

The global uberification of commercial property and the workplace ⁰

by Anthony Brown • Facilities management, Features, Property, Technology, Workplace design

Technology doesn’t just transform the world, it reshapes our language. So, we all need to get used to the word uberification as well as the idea of it. Based on the success of the on demand taxi service Uber, the word refers to the way a product or service becomes available to customers on demand via the Internet. Customers book a service only at the point of consumption. This represents an entirely new commercial model and is the defining characteristic of the new 21st Century economy. Uber may have provided the tipping point, going from start up to market valuation of $66 billion in just 7 years, but its success has given us a name for a process that is reshaping businesses and customer experiences across the entire economy, including in the commercial property sector.

October 13, 2016

London needs to adapt to the changing world of work, claims think tank ⁰

by Neil Franklin • Architecture, Cities, News, Property, Workplace design

Think Tank New London Architecture (NLA) which creates a forum for debate on the built environment, has launched its findings and recommendations from its landmark WRK / LDN Insight study on work and workplaces in London. NLA calls on central government, the Mayor of London and other stakeholders in the capital to act to maintain the capital’s position as a preeminent commercial centre. The report claims that, as the digital economy continues to expand, new suppliers of workspace are rapidly emerging – from co-working providers to ‘fab labs’, makerspaces, incubators and innovation centres. The insight study concludes that the affordable business space that currently supports these industries is at risk. London needs new innovative mixed-use models of city planning to support these changes and adapt to the changing world of work.