Shares in serviced office group IWG (LON:IWG) jumped 20 per cent on Monday morning, after it received takeover offers from three separate equity groups. Shares had already risen 10 percent before the weekend as speculation surrounding possible offers heightened. The group, who were previously named Regus, then admitted to receiving bid offers from Lone Star, Starwood and TDR Capital. “The board is evaluating the possible offers with its financial advisers and shareholders will be updated in due course,” the statement said. Earlier this year IWG rejected a takeover bid from Brookfield Asset Management and private equity house Onex, that valued the group at around £2.5 billion. The flexible working market has seen a spike of interest in the UK of late, with startups and small businesses preferring to take part of a serviced office with other businesses instead of forking out the entire rent for a space on their own. However, IWG face tough competition from rivals like millennial favourite WeWorks and The Office Group. Shares in IWG (LON:IWG) are currently trading up 20.56 percent at 303.80 (1001GMT).

Npower has announced plans to increase energy bills by an average of £64 a year, affecting up to a million customers. The gas and electricity supplier will increase bills by an average rate of 5.3 percent and will come into effect on 17 June. “Announcing this price change today isn’t a decision we’ve taken lightly,” said Simon Stacey, managing director, domestic markets at Npower. The group has blamed government policy changes and increases in energy costs for the rise. Stacey said that wholesale costs are on the rise, “particularly wholesale and policy costs which are largely outside our control” – have been on the rise for some time “and we need to reflect these in our prices”. “Less than half of our customers are on our standard tariff – one of the lowest levels among the larger energy suppliers. We continue to encourage all our customers to look at our range of competitive fixed deals and switch to a tariff that best suits their needs.” The tariff rise is made up of the 4.4 percent increase in gas and 6.2 percent rise in electricity. “This is a chunky rise from Npower – all we need now is something from SSE and it’s a full house from the Big Six,” said Stephen Murray, an energy expert at MoneySuperMarket. “Npower says 60 percent of its customers won’t be affected but that still means 40 percent – or one million people – will.” Price increases from the other Bix Six have already been announced. British Gas customers will face a 5.5 percent increase from 29 May. The move will affect 4.1 million people who will have to pay an average increase of £60. Npower’s 5.3 percent increase will affect one million customers and will be enforced from 17 June. Scottish Power is increasing prices by 5.5 percent and will affect almost one million people from 1 June.  

House of Fraser department store group lost almost £44 million in 2017 due to falling sales. The store’s potential new Chinese owner, C.Banner (HKG: 1028), revealed at the Stock Exchange on Thursday that the £43.9 million reversed the pre-tax profit of £1.5 million for the previous year. Sales fell 6.3 percent to £787.8 million in the tough UK market. The figures released included the start-up and operating costs of House of Fraser China. Separate UK figures have not been reported. C.Banner has said that House of Fraser will become “more stable” following the restructuring plan and will “take advantage of its well-known brand to capture growth potential”. The group also blamed Brexit and London terror attacks for the volatility in the UK retail market. “The Brexit referendum and the UK’s resultant decision to leave the European Union and the terrorist attack in London, combined with a rapidly evolving retail market, produced a period of uncertainty and volatility that resulted in a difficult trading environment for the whole retail industry in the UK,” said the document released by C.Banner. C.Banner has said it plans to buy 51 percent stake in House of Fraser in order to “enhance the company’s presence in the retail market in [China] as well as to facilitate the company to lay a good foundation for a new brand and retail roadmap overseas”. The deal depends on the agreement by bondholder and shareholders, as well as the restructuring plan where about 20 stores are expected to close.    

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has announced plans to scrap the €850 million (£743 million) data centre in West Ireland. The tech giant made plans for the new European data centre back in February 2015 but following three years of planning approval delays, the project will be scrapped. “Despite our best efforts, delays in the approval process have forced us to make other plans and we will not be able to move forward with the data centre,” said Apple in a statement on Thursday. “While disappointing, this setback will not dampen our enthusiasm for future projects in Ireland as our business continues to grow,” added Apple, referring to the plans to expand the European headquarters in County Cork, employing over 6,000 people. Heather Humphreys, Ireland’s minister for business and enterprise expressed disappointment in the decision. “There is no disputing that Apple’s decision is very disappointing, particularly for Athenry and the west of Ireland,” she said. “These delays have, if nothing else, underlined our need to make the state’s planning and legal processes more efficient. The Government has therefore already been working, over the last number of months, to make improvements to those processes. This will ensure we are better placed to take advantage of future such investment opportunities, whether from data centre providers or other sectors,” she added. When plans were put on hold in 2016, it attracted 2,000 people to gather and march in support of the new Apple centre in Athenry, Ireland. The new data centre would have created approximately 300 construction jobs as well as 150 permanent jobs in the country. When announcing the plans for the data centre in 2015, the company also announced plans for a data centre in Denmark, which opened last year.      

BMW (ETR: BMW) has extended a recall of 312,000 cars in the UK, which have been found to stall while being driven. The group initially recalled 36,410 last year over safety issues but has extended it after the BBC’s Watchdog identified similar issues in cars that were not originally covered. “BMW is expanding the existing B+ battery connector UK recall. This relates to predecessor generations of the 1 Series, 3 Series, Z4 and X1 built between March 2007 and September 2011,” said a spokesperson. “BMW will be contacting all affected customers by post advising them of how they can book their car in to have the work carried out. We will commence contacting affected customers in the next three weeks.” An investigation by the BBC Watchdog found that the fault could affect a wider number of cars. The initial recall was launched following the death of Narayan Gurung, who died on Christmas day in 2016 after he crashed into a tree to avoid a broken-down BMW in Surrey. “We now recognise that there may have been some cases of similar power supply issues in vehicles not covered by the original recall,” said BMW, in response to the investigation. “In order to reassure customers with concerns about the safety of their vehicles, we are voluntarily extending the recall.” “We are therefore announcing today that we will take the proactive step of expanding the existing UK recall to cover all vehicles potentially affected by the power supply issue.” The car manufacturer has recalled up to 500,000 cars in the US just in 2013, as well as in Australia, South Africa and Canada.