Business

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has pledged to focus on “new products and early initiatives” after announcing he is to step down as chief executive later this year. Mr Bezos is to hand over the role to Andy Jassy during the summer but will stay on as executive chair of the company he founded nearly three

Streaming audio giant Spotify said fourth quarter podcast consumption nearly doubled, premium subscribers hit 155 million and monthly active users jumped 27% to 345 million in the fourth quarter of 2020 — helping drive a 17% increase in revenue. Premium subs were up from 144 in the third quarter and 124 the year before. In

Amazon has announced its founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is to step down from running the business as it reported record revenues for its core Christmas quarter, topping $100bn for the first time with help from the coronavirus pandemic. The e-commerce, cloud data storage and entertainment giant said Bezos would become executive chair during the

Karl Williams, the longtime Paramount Pictures publicist who was integral in campaigns for the studio’s Transformers, Iron Man, Star Trek, Indiana Jones and other franchises, died Sunday of liver complications at Glenbrook Hospital in Glenview, IL. He was 52. For those like me who worked with Karl, he was a hysterically funny, good-guy, cinema savant

Interest-free “buy-now-pay-later” (BNPL) deals face tighter regulation under plans announced by the government. A review published by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) found that the currently unregulated use of BNPL products nearly quadrupled to £2.7bn during 2020 and five million people had used them since the start of the pandemic. It concluded that the market

SiriusXM swung to a $677 million net loss last quarter from a $243 million profit the year before on a one-time, noncash charge of $976 million at Pandora. The anticipated hit was based on Pandora’s royalty cost structure. Quarterly revenue rose 6% to $2.19 billion, beating Wall Street expectations. The shares were up 1.4% in

Scotch whisky has endured £500m of export losses because of a trade dispute not of its making, according to industry figures. The Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) said shipments of single malt to the United States had fallen by more than a third since the Trump administration imposed a 25% tariff on the tipple in October

There was some drama up at the Hollywood sign today that seems to be a case of a good cause handled in a bad way. About 90 minutes ago, the landmark that looms over the city saw the W and the D attempted to be changed into Bs to read “Hollyboob.” After a near-instant splash

ASOS has agreed to buy Topshop, Topman and Miss Selfridge – but their 70 stores, employing 2,500 people, are not included in the deal. The online retailer is paying a total of £330m for the brands, plus stock currently held and on order, following the collapse late last year of Sir Philip Green’s Arcadia retail

EXCLUSIVE: It’s A Sin actor Callum Scott Howells has signed with Duncan Millership at Anonymous Content. The recent graduate of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama plays Colin in Russel T Davies’ lauded new Channel 4/HBO Max AIDS drama, which marks Howells’ first screen role. The five-part drama follows the joy and heartbreak

Serco, the outsourcing giant behind NHS Test and Trace, has confirmed that it was hit by a cyber attack – but told Sky News its oft-criticised scheme had not been impacted. The company won several coronavirus-related contracts, including NHS Test and Trace, via a procurement system that came under fire from the public spending watchdog

UPDATE: As the ban on outdoor dining in California lifts and cases of the Covid-19 variant B.1.1.7 begin to emerge in the state, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has reported Sunday that there are 5,925 new positive cases of Covid-19 and 124 new deaths. The new tally brings Los Angeles county to

ASOS is this weekend on the brink of capping one of the most tumultuous months in the history of the British high street by sealing a deal worth nearly £300m to buy TopShop and Miss Selfridge. Sky News understands that the online fashion retailer hopes to sign an agreement with Arcadia Group’s administrators ahead of

Sony Pictures Classics has picked up Clint Bentley’s Jockey on the second night of this year’s Sundance Film Festival, acquiring all worldwide rights to the film. Set to premiere on Sunday, Jan. 31 in the U.S. Dramatic Competition section, Bentley’s film follows an aging jockey (Clifton Collins, Jr.) who hopes to win one last title

The UK will formally apply to join a huge free trade pact including Australia, Canada, Japan and Singapore, under the government’s post-Brexit plans. International Trade Secretary Liz Truss will use a conversation with ministers in Japan and New Zealand on Monday to request membership of the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Announcing the move

The vaccination site at Dodger Stadium briefly shut down as anti-vax protestors interrupted services at around 2 p.m. on Saturday. Dodger Stadium, which is the county’s large-scale Covid-19 vaccination site, closed briefly and unexpectedly after protestors appeared at the entrance to the baseball stadium. Some protestors carried signs calling for Gov. Gavin Newsom to resign,

Lenders to Virgin Active are preparing for a fight over the future of one of Britain’s biggest gym chains as its owners draw up a radical blueprint to help it survive the pandemic. Sky News has learnt that a syndicate of roughly half a dozen banks held a beauty parade of financial advisers this week

“The projection is that at the very end of March, early April,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the more contagious UK variant of Covid-19 “will become more dominant than the wild type. “The fact is that when you have a virus that has ability to transmit more efficiently than the wild type in the community, sooner

Financial markets have been rocked this week by a battle initiated by ordinary people against those who are usually dubbed market manipulators – hedge funds. This is not being fought on trading floors but online and is a consequence of an explosion in the popularity of amateur share trading by armchair investors and collaboration among

For the second year running, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival and the Stagecoach Country Music Festival were canceled, according to a release posted by their promoter, Goldenvoice. The festival promoter posted an order from the health officer of Riverside County citing the “worldwide epidemic of Covid-19 disease.” The order referenced the worldwide appeal