Oligopoly

Good morning, you glorious beasts.

MPs want to force Deliveroo and Uber Eats to police their riders using 40mph "fake e-bikes".

These bikes are largely unregistered and uninsured, and increasingly liable to explode as riders try to procure the fastest steed for the lowest price.

At the moment, gig economy apps can shirk responsibility for their riders by calling them "contractors."

Meanwhile, a thriving black market has emerged where riders rent each other's app profiles to bypass their flimsy vetting processes. Lovely.

JOBS
Accountancy firms are replacing graduates with AI

The “Big Four” accountancy firms — we’re talking Deloitte, KPMG, EY and PwC — have cut back graduate hiring by up to 29% and are replacing them with robots because:

The golden age is over

The “Big Four” went on a hiring binge during the pandemic as businesses raced to digitise. 

But the boom years are over. Clients have tighter purse strings, and consultancy work has gone rather limp. 

If they don’t replace graduates with robots, how else will they pay their handsome, hardworking partners seven-figure payouts? 

So they’re offshoring to cut costs

Setting up teams in Malaysia, the Philippines, and India. Which are less expensive than Old Blighty. 

Lucky Filipinos, I suppose. 

Accountancy graduates are ripe for the cull

Because the tasks usually performed by junior accountants (e.g., summarising long, tedious reports) can be easily done by ChatGPT. 

Hence why graduate job adverts for accountants are down 44% year on year — far higher than most other graduate job postings. 

The “Big Four” are pivoting

Deloitte, PwC and EY are developing ‘AI assurance’ tools to prove to the world that their AI systems aren’t sexist, racist, or a threat to national security. 

And like every consultant worth their salt, the “Big Four” know how to profit from a rising trend.

MANUFACTURING
Are we witnessing a Rolls-Royce bubble?

The UK aerospace manufacturer is now the darling of the FTSE 100, its share price having risen 870% in the last 3 years. They just won a massive government contract to build small nuclear reactors. But some are worried because:

There’s a problem with their engines

Which isn’t great for a company that mainly builds engines. 

Behold the Trent 1000, a popular aeroplane engine that has, for the last decade, been beset by problems. 

The Trent 1000 is three times more likely to need repairs than its rivals, and has single-handedly managed to ground hundreds of planes, leading to cancelled flights, and Rolls-Royce paying roughly £3 billion in damages.

Which is why the former boss of BA said:

Rolls-Royce’s share price is “baffling” 

Sure, they’ve fixed the original faults. But they’ve got a big, fat backlog of orders they can’t fulfil. 

Call it supply chain issues. Rolls-Royce can’t source the raw materials it needs to build its engines. 

Rolls-Royce had to find new titanium suppliers after Russia became a global leper by invading Ukraine. 

But those new suppliers are struggling, what with the high interest rates, inflation, and dearth of capital. Two of them even burned down, which can’t have helped. 

Which means more grounded planes

And therefore higher fares and delayed flights. 

While the UK government lobbies South Korea to use Rolls-Royce engines in their new fighter jets, it remains to be seen whether the good times will last forever. 

MONEY
More people are killing their sick pets

Because vet bills have increased by 60% since 2015. And according to the British Veterinary Association, British pet owners are putting down their sick animals instead of forking out for the medical care they need. 

Vets blame big companies 

Which are buying up little local veterinary practices with a romping, wanton pleasure.

In 2013, only 10% of vet practices were owned by big companies. Now, 6 corporate vet groups dominate 60% of the market. 

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) - the antitrust watchdog - is currently investigating whether this oligopoly of vets is causing this offensively fast rise in prices.

Here’s the rub: big companies introduce “financial targets”, and vets feel under pressure to drive revenue. 

These companies are creepy

Take IVC Evidensia, one of the biggest vet companies. 

It allegedly monitors its vets, and encourages them to compete with each other via what they call “clinical practice milestones”.

All in all, these big companies are forcing pet owners to make some terribly sad choices. 

NEWS BITES
This just in…

• 💻️ 👎️ Hugo Boss told a Liverpudlian pet shop to delete its site because it contained the word “boss”, according to the site owner Ben McDonald, who received a letter from the fashion brand giving him 10 days to take the site down or face legal action. A spokesperson for Hugo Boss said that while they knew the word “boss” is commonly used in Merseyside to denote “great”, they needed to “protect our brand rights”. 

• 🥙 🤖 One of Britain’s biggest kebab chains is trialling “robot meat shavers” in 3 of its 150 franchises. And it’s all because the government imposed higher National Insurance and Minimum Wage contributions on it. Crucially, robots can’t unionise, don’t need money, and can shave 40kg of doner meat in 3 hours, as opposed to 8 by hand. Here’s Starmer’s cunning plan to turn Britain into an AI superpower: make humans so expensive that kebab chains replace them with robots. 

• 👨‍🎓 📉 UK universities have fallen in world rankings. This is the second year in a row this has happened. Meanwhile, universities in China, India, Malaysia and Taiwan are climbing steadily up the rankings, all of whom have received increased government funding. UK universities, meanwhile, are cutting costs across the board. Weird that. 

• ☢️ 🚀 A UK-based startup is developing a nuclear fusion-powered rocket that could mean travelling to Mars takes 30 days, not 7 months. The Sunbird rocket (one model costs as little as $70 million to make) acts like a high-speed cart-horse to larger spacecraft, and is designed to reach speeds of up to 329,000 miles per hour. The startup plans to give it a test drive in 2027. Elon Musk will have to change his knickers. 

• 📦️ 🤑 Amazon will invest £40 billion in the UK because they “like what they see” in PM Keir Starmer, whose government has done away with restrictive planning permissions. The US tech giant will now build 4 new delivery and fulfilment centres in places like Hull and Northampton, providing 4,000 jobs to boot. How nice for Hull. 

• 🔍️ 🤝 Google might be forced to show users rival search engines because the CMA wants the tech giant to be “more competitive”. The antitrust watchdog launched an investigation into Google’s search engine monopoly this January, with various organisations claiming that Google’s monopoly has caused them massive declines in traffic and sales.