Abbey has increased its mortgage lending by more than 10% since last year.

Despite the slowdown in mortgage lending, which is at its lowest level in terms of new mortgages since January 1999, Abbey has increased its share of net lending in the UK mortgage market to 15.9%, up from 4.9% a year ago. This signals the bank’s intention to grow its market share while many of its competitors struggle amid the credit crunch.
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Ideally drug supply should be a simple and transparent chain that connects the manufacturer and patient in as few steps as possible. However, in practice it can be a highly circuitous one that includes several intermediaries before reaching a pharmacy. Notwithstanding the possibility that drug integrity can be compromised in transit, complex supply chains risk counterfeit drug entry.

Driven in great part by the lost revenues such arbitrage brings, manufacturers have implemented several strategies to tighten their grip on the drug supply chain, with direct to pharmacy distribution schemes implemented in the UK being one of the most recent. However, the legitimacy of such action is often unclear, and a recent European Commission recommendation spells bad news for manufacturers seeking greater supply chain control, according to a new report.
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The time has come to think strategically about systems management, and how it can be used in a co-ordinated and effective manner to deliver real business benefit. This is one of the key conclusions drawn in recently published report, ‘IT Systems Management’, as organisations demand the IT infrastructure delivers increased levels of availability and quality of service, the focus for IT managers is shifting towards a business service perspective.

Organisational IT structures are often characterised by many different silo’ed teams of technical specialists. These silos often drive the technology selection process in organisations, which to a large extent is governed by the existing skills within the IT department. Continue reading “Systems Management Evolving to Deliver Real Business Benefits” »

While Australia’s woes have attracted most media attention, all the wine-producing countries of the Southern Hemisphere face challenges in the year ahead. According to a recent report, wine production in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina and Chile in a marked state of flux.

Epitomising the “feast or famine” nature which sometimes besets agricultural commodities, 2008 sees Australia move from its much-publicised grape glut to a state of balance. However, that balance will not last long, the report warns. Having seen the last harvest hit by the country’s severe drought, further small harvests in 2008, 2009 and possibly beyond will leave the industry facing a serious shortage of grapes and struggling to meet global demand for its wines.

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India is the world’s sixth largest energy consumer, consuming about 3% of the world’s total energy per year.

In the face of growing demand, India’s electricity sector faces problems of capacity, poor reliability, and frequent blackouts. The anticipated electricity shortage is estimated at between 11 and 18%. Currently 79% of electricity comes from fossil fuels, mostly coal.

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What’s a low-cost car? It’s clearly defined on low-cost but it’s a very broad category in terms of the sorts of vehicles that qualify - there are different approaches to getting to that low price point.

One talking point in the industry is the Nano and whether it might be exported to Europe - it was shown in Geneva after all. I reckon Geneva was more about Tata announcing itself on the world stage, just ahead of the JLR deal. Nano got the firm plenty of column-inches in the world’s press.

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Parallel traders are the thorn in the side for pharmaceutical companies operating in Europe. Local sales mangers see their bottom line eroded as independent exporters undercut them with their own product! The considerable efforts that pharma companies have gone to prevent this grey trade have largely failed. The majority of legal actions against traders have been thrown out as freedom of movement of goods enshrined in the Treaty of Rome underpins the European Union.

Now big pharma may have found a way of restricting parallel traders but taking on the distribution of product themselves and thus controlling the supply chain. The adoption of a direct-to-pharmacy (DTP) model, where pharmaceutical manufacturers sell their products directly to pharmacies and appoint a limited number of logistics service providers (LSPs) that are paid a fee to deliver the medicines on their behalf.

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Many commentators have argued that today’s global ‘credit crunch’ has its origins in the relaxation of monetary policy following the bursting of the dot com bubble and efforts to avert a US recession post-9/11. Its impact on the global economy will be felt via the same transmission mechanisms that have led to past contagion. However, comparisons with the past may not be that relevant as the significant pace of economic globalisation has redefined the balance of power.

The report Surviving the Credit Crunch: How Vulnerable Are Emerging Markets argues that the global economy’s evolution over the past decade - notably the rise of China and India and the political and economic maturation of many emerging markets - mean that the identity of those most vulnerable, and the ways in which they are exposed, has changed.
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Mobile commerce is potentially important for a wide range of industries, including telecommunications, IT, finance, retail and the media, as well as for end-users. It will work best in those areas where it can emphasise the core virtue of mobile networks – convenience.

Japan and Korea were one of the first to offer low-cost models to content providers, and the mobile content market is flourishing in those markets. Most of the proceeds flow to the content providers yet, in the rest of the world, the mobile operators are adamant that they want to have a much larger share of the spoils. Strategy Analytics estimated that Japanese consumers made contactless payments worth $900 million using their mobiles in 2006, including prepaid travel tickets. This can be partly attributed to Sony’s FeliCa contactless payments standard that has been adopted by banks and mobile phones companies.

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While Maasai warriors from Tanzania managed to run the London marathon in shoes made from car tyres, a new report shows that Westerners increasingly demand specialist footwear designed for specific sports, activities and occupations.

In the case of sports footwear, one of the main market drivers is the ability of the shoe to improve the performance of the wearer. In some sectors, such as football boots, this feature is regarded by companies such as Adidas and Nike as being more important than cost. Fabric manufacturers are therefore being encouraged to develop high performance products which continually push the boundaries in terms of weight, moisture management properties and grip.

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