Morgan has rolled out a V6 Roadster and a 3 Wheeler inspired by the UK’s legendary Brooklands racing circuit. Each limited to 50 units, the new specials are “designed to celebrate the ancestry of British racing cars and their styling” with special color combinations, satin finishes and detailing.
The Roadster comes in Jaguar “Brooklands” Green, Speed Silver Satin hood and radiator cowl and silver A-pillars and window surrounds. A black stitched leather interior will be set off by a special Brooklands steering wheel, light silver gauge bezels, a sculpted box cover and more space for the pedals. The Roadster costs 40,000 pounds ($61,532 US) plus Value Added Tax, a supplementary options list allowing you to add generously to that price.
The 3 Wheeler will come standard in that same Jaguar “Brooklands” Green hue, but a polished body with extra rivets will also be offered as a cost option. We have been informed that the Brooklands Edition 3 Wheeler will be offered for sale in the US, and the price will be announced in September. The press release below has more.
The London Fire Brigade said Monday it was facing a rising number of callouts for people trapped in handcuffs, blaming it on a best-selling erotic novel’s “Fifty Shades of Grey effect”. …read more
Immunity has never looked so good. Scientists in the UK recently released images that provide the clearest snapshot of how white blood immune cells attack viral infections and tumors. They are hopeful that these clearer pictures will provide important insights into how diseases can be treated. White blood cells are the fighters of the body, tackling infections and cancers on our behalf… …read more
Mothers who smoke during pregnancy are more likely to have children with conduct disorder (CD), according to a study published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry. The study, carried out by researchers at the University of Leicester in the UK, analyzed the relationship between smoking during pregnancy and the risk of the child developing CD… …read more
By Tero Kuittinen European operator results are streaming in and the picture is bleak. Telefonica Germany: mobile service revenue down 5.2%. UK’s biggest operator, EE: service revenue down 4.4%. Telenor Denmark: mobile service revenue down 14%. In the most affluent markets of Europe, operators are delivering sales declines. These are the markets that dominate Europe’s high-end smartphone sales. And it is quite likely that carrier subsidy and marketing expenses now must come down in the core mobile markets of Europe: Germany, France, the UK and Spain. This in turn means that phone vendors must start spending more on marketing or accept softer demand. …read more
Here’s a paradox about Great Britain. In many ways, it’s a more progressive country than the United States, its colonial offspring. It has a more generous welfare state (including national health care), a more progressive tax structure, and a third major political party to the left of Labour. Most workers are entitled to at least 28 paid days of vacation per year, and same-sex marriage will soon be legal throughout England and Wales.
And yet Great Britain maintains one of the most conservative institutions on the planet: a hereditary monarchy, something Americans would never countenance. This despite the fact that King Charles I lost two civil wars, leading to his own decapitation and the short-lived abolition of the monarchy, in the mid-17th century.
And though the royal family’s political significance has long since been reduced to the ceremonial, the Windsors still have a massive financial footprint. As sovereign, the Queen owns the Crown Estate, a property portfolio worth £8.1 billion ($12.4 billion) as of last month — the first time its value has exceeded £8 billion. It includes a lot of prime real estate — “large parts of London’s West End,” “15 retail parks in various towns and cities,” shopping centers, offices, agricultural lands, forests, and “most UK coastline,” according to the BBC — and 15 percent of its annual revenues is used to fund the monarchy. The rest goes to the Treasury.
As a result of the these assets’ recent performance, the Queen is getting a raise: the Sovereign Grant, as her cut of the Crown Estate’s revenues is called, is set to increase next year from £36.1 million to £37.89 million (more than $55 million) — a gain of 5 percent, and the second consecutive bump to her allowance.
“The Crown Estate as a whole dates from the time of the Norman Conquest,” explains the monarchy’s official website — more than 900 years ago — but the current arrangement came into effect in 1760. That was the year King George III — the intolerable tyrant of the Declaration of Independence — signed the revenues over to the Treasury, and in return, stopped having to pay for the civil government, the national debt, and his own personal debt. Those expenses were covered by something called the Civil List, funded by the Treasury and supplemented more recently by grants from other departments, until the Sovereign Grant Act of 2011. Buckingham Palace called the change “a modern, transparent and simpler way of funding the head of state,” but opponents of the monarchy are unconvinced. “Pegging royal funding to Crown Estate revenue makes no sense at all,” said the group Republic, which advocates replacing the Queen (or King) with an elected head of state. “The two are not related. Crown Estate revenue has always been there to provide funds for the government.”
Microsoft has announced Xbox One games in the UK will come with a Recommended Retail Price (RRP) of £49.99.
OXM spotted the prices on the company’s online store, which currently lists Dead Rising 3, Ryse: Son of Rome, Forza Motorsport 5 and Kinect Sports Rivals for that price.
Last month, Microsoft announced that first-party Xbox One games would be sold in North America for $59.99, which is the same price games are currently sold for there. In terms of the UK, it’s worth remembering that retailers are likely to undercut Microsoft – in fact, Amazon is already listing Need for Speed Rivals at £43.99.
I found this to be an innovated use of 3-D printers.
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“Researchers from Birmingham City University in the UK have scanned items like this precious 17th-century watch in exquisite detail, and recreated them using a 3D printer. Visitors will be able to handle copies of the items, something that should be of particular benefit to visually impaired people.”
The prolonged heat wave that has bathed the UK in sunshine over the past month has given the country an unexpected taste of summer that has seemed to be missing in recent years. …read more
A London court will on Wednesday rule whether a British man accused of orchestrating his bride’s murder on their South African honeymoon is mentally fit to face extradition. …read more
We never met an eggplant we didn’t like, but we know it’s been a tougher road for some people. We’ve heard eggplant referred to as spongy, slimy and bland. GUYS if that is how you feel, you are doing eggplant wrong. This amazing member of the nightshade family (don’t worry, Gwyneth Paltrow isn’t eating them anymore, so there’s more for us) is probably one of the most versatile ingredients we can think of. What eggplant does best is soak up the flavors of whatever you cook it with. If you make sure its surroundings are delicious, the eggplant will be delicious as well.
A few things to keep in mind when you shop for eggplant (or aubergine, if you’re shopping in the UK): not all eggplants were created equal. You’ll want to match your eggplant to the a cuisine it originated nearby. For preparations like eggplant parmesan, you’ll want a big, stout Italian eggplant. When stir-frying with chiles, the denser, smaller Japanese eggplant work best. For Thai eggplant recipes, we love baby green eggplants. Whichever eggplant you decide to buy, make sure it’s firm to the touch, shiny and free of blemishes. If your eggplant is mushy before you cook it, it probably won’t fare much better afterward.
Auroch Digital, the Bristol, UK-based studio, are best known for their recent “Game the News” initiative, in which they produced games based on recent news events including the Syrian civil war. …read more
On paper it seems an almost impossible goal: raise $32 million in a month through a crowdfunding campaign in order to roll out a new high-end cellular phone. But that’s exactly what UK-based technology company, Canonical, is looking to do. The company created Ubuntu (pronounced Oo-Boon-Too), a Linux-based operating system that integrates PC, tablet, mobile and television formats. Its newest smartphone project – which is called The Ubuntu Edge – will be its first piece of phone hardware, if it’s funded. The phone will boast a 4.5-inch sapphire crystal screen, 720p screen with a multi-core processor, 4GB of RAM, dual LTE antennas and 128GB of storage. The Edge will run Ubuntu’s OS as well as Android, according to its campaign pitch. Price? You can buy one through the crowdfunding campaign for $830. (See Canonical’s pitch of The Ubuntu Edge below) But can the company reach its $32 million mark? As of July 23, the campaign had raised almost $3.5 million on Indiegogo. The best reason to believe that the company can is Canonical’s 39-year-old CEO and founder, Mark Shuttleworth. The successful, South African serial entrepreneur was not named one of FORBES’ “12 Most Disruptive Names In Business” this year for nothing. In a move akin to charging a heard of oncoming bulls, Shuttleworth has puts his company head to head with deeply entrenched competitors by crafting a third operating system that plays in multiple device categories. In the mobile space, Ubuntu is up against Apple’s OS and Google’s Android, among others. In the PC realm – where Shuttleworth estimates some 20 million use Ubuntu– Microsoft is king. The company also has ambitions in the TV space. Shuttleworth’s obviously not one to do things the easy way (his idea of vacation spots have included Antarctica and the International Space Station). …read more
The woman who directed her pony into McDonald’s —where it pooped on the floor—says she’s surprised at the media reaction. “I think over the last couple of years, we’ve been to that McDonald’s at least half a dozen times on the horses,” UK mom Christine McGrail tells the Telegraph… …read more
It looks like the addition of a Royal Baby isn’t the only big news coming out of the UK this week. Bentley has ended all of the will they/won’t they speculation by confirming today that it will produce an SUV. Earmarked to go on sale in 2016, the as-yet unnamed Bentley SUV will help create an extra 1,000 jobs in the UK.
While no concrete details have been released, Bentley says that it will be the “most luxurious and most powerful SUV” on the market. Past rumors have indicated that the SUV could look completely different from the 2012 EXP 9 F Concept shown above, be renamed the Falcon and offer options like a plug-in hybrid version and three-row seating. To prepare for a fourth model in its lineup, Bentley will be investing 800 million British pounds (around $1.2 billion USD) into its Crewe headquarters and production lines over the next three years. Scroll down for Bentley’s press release officially confirming the new SUV.
British companies can expect a temporary boost from the birth of Prince William and Kate’s new baby as souvenirs and champagne fly off the shelves and tourists flock to the country, business leaders and analysts said Tuesday. …read more
Lightning strikes and flooding caused severe delays for commuters on several mainline rail services across England and Scotland early on Tuesday. …read more
For many husbands and wives, a deep sense of unhappiness just isn’t a good enough reason to end their marriage.
Why? According to recent study by UK law firm Slater & Gordon, many unhappy spouses say they simply lack the courage to divorce. What’s more, of the 2,000 married people surveyed by the firm, a fifth said they felt trapped in their relationship but would only consider ending their marriage if their future financial security could be guaranteed. (Click here to see the top ten reasons spouses stay in unhappy relationships, according to the study.)
The marriage study hit a nerve with our divorced readers on Facebook and Twitter, so much so that many weighed in with their own thoughts on why people stay in unhappy relationships.
(AP)—Internet service providers in Britain will be asked to automatically block access to pornography sites unless customers opt in, Prime Minister David Cameron announced Monday. …read more
It took 1.5 years, but a DRB-Hicom managing director told Malaysia’s Business Times that the company has “cleaned up” the situation at Lotus from its finances to its marketing and image. The clean-up job we’re most interested in, the product portfolio, will be demonstrated by financial investment in a three-year program of “variants based on existing products – variants with improved technology, improved performance.”
You’ll notice mention of the word “variants” three times but no mention of the phrase “new models.” We knew that with the death of the five-new-model turnaround plan dreamed up by ex-Lotus CEO Dany Bahar DRB-Hicom said there’d only be three distinct lines – which is the current number – but during Lotus’ trouble-plagued 2012 it sold just 80 cars all year, and for a tense spell it really wasn’t clear if DRB-Hicom would commit to even keeping Lotus alive, much less investing in it.
It’s not clear how much is being put into in the three-year program of offshoot models like the 345-horsepower Exige S Roadster (pictured), but it might be fair to say this is where Lotus’ revival really begins, and does so with baby steps. Autocar reports that DRB-Hicom has already put 100 million pounds into the English carmaker, and as its issues were worked through Lotus has sold almost as many cars in the first five months of this year as it did all of last. That has not only convinced the Malaysian minders to throw more money its way, but the UK’s business secretary has also approved a 10-million-pound investment into Lotus through the Regional Growth Facility program.
However, with the Evora and Elise the only other models to earn the “Definites” tag this could put us another three years away from the return of the Esprit. Last we heard it was ready save for a management sign-off, but it goes into reverse – again – to an underground garage called “nebulosity.”
