When it does eventually happen, it seems certain Mr Malone, who is after all the world’s chief cable guy, will play the role of kingmaker and, whoever is by then running NTL, he’ll want his own man, Telewest’s Adam Singer, in the hot seat to ensure that the UK cable industry finally lives up [...]
When it does eventually happen, it seems certain Mr Malone, who is after all the world’s chief cable guy, will play the role of kingmaker and, whoever is by then running NTL, he’ll want his own man, Telewest’s Adam Singer, in the hot seat to ensure that the UK cable industry finally lives up to its full potential.Argos comes good If you were looking for one of the more surprising high street success stories of recent times, you would be hard pressed to find a better one than Argos. With its mammoth catalogues, eccentric ordering process and those stubby little pens for filling out the forms, it hardly looks like the retail concept of the future But this strange beast is firing on all cylinders. Like-for-like sales are up by 13 per cent, one of the best retail performances around, and by the end of the year there will be 500 stores with more planned.All this is a long way from what was predicted when Lord Wolfson of Sunningdale, then chairman of Great Universal Stores, stumped up £1.9bn for Argos back in April 1998. Argos was seen as a dated, ex-growth concept that had little reason to exist. A former part of BAT, the former Greenshield stamps business had suffered from chronic under-investment and a near-terminal lack of innovation.
Lord Wolfson himself appeared to admit that he had bought a pup when he complained to the Takeover Panel after the deal went through that the Argos management had made misleading statements about the performance of its stores in the Netherlands.This all came to nothing, but the last laugh goes to GUS. Never mind Burberry, it is Argos that is the jewel in the GUS crown with an estimated value of £3bn-plus. How on earth did this happen? The retail boom has helped, but there have also been big economies wrung belated from the deal by combining Argos’ buying power with that of the GUS home shopping division, which includes old-fashioned catalogues such as Marshall Ward Prices have been kept at rock bottom as a result. The product range has been extended to more than 9,000 items, including things such as garden furniture, and customers can also now choose to have their orders delivered to their homes for a small charge.In a stock market littered with the corpses of so many failed, over-priced takeovers, Argos has proved a notable exception. Lord Wolfson has been vindicated, but that won’t stop the stock market demanding change. With Burberry set for a partial float in June, GUS will look a odd creature with Argos on one side and the Experian financial information business on the other. There are some synergies between the two but not enough to justify the conglomerate discount the shares trade at.
The time has come surely come to break up GUS completely.j.warner independent.co.uk. Eurotunnel has for so long been seen as a black hole into which investors put their money at some peril, that it is with much trepidation that the City is now predicting light at the end of the tunnel. It put new security measures in place at the end of last year after refugees made organised efforts to storm the tunnel and head for the UK. Their incursions had cost the business £20m in 2001.It is also recovering from the string of other problems that blighted the stock last year, including the business slowdown and foot-and-mouth outbreak that hit freight levels. Operating revenues were up a little in the first three months of 2002, to £130.3m from £129.1m in the same period last year.
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