The investment would help strengthen our energy security, create skilled jobs and help to build a new generation of homegrown nuclear technology that will power our economy for decades to come.
The paint effect was camouflage using mimicry and disruptive patterns to confuse enemy pilots. It's one image in an exhibition of around 45 paintings and posters, plus some letters and documents recording life in wartime London.
We've eliminated the need for that Alexa-speak, such as 'turn on bedroom lamp two', you can just speak naturally. Alexa+ knows you, your home, your family. And is available anywhere, any time, as life does not happen in a chat box.
Take these gates at Polegate station. They are equipped with a barcode reader, a place to tap a card, and even a slot for inserting a ticket. However, it all appears to have come to naught, and the gates opened wide. Windows is slumped in the corner like someone on the last train home after a night out that involved drinking too much booze.
The TechFirst Women's Programme, backed by £4 million of government funding, aims to create at least 300 paid placements in technology roles across the UK. The programme will work with businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises, to identify opportunities for women to gain experience in fields such as software development, digital engineering, data science and artificial intelligence.
James B. Hill should be patron saint of Northwest Ohio - or at least patron saint of this story. He invented a machine called the Buckeye Traction Ditcher, and he checks all my boxes. Hill is our hero: His invention drained the swamp in a matter of years, leading to its complete settlement shortly thereafter. He brought the normalcy we see today.
Our creative industries face a clear and present danger from uncredited and unremunerated use of copyrighted material to train AI models. Photographers, musicians, authors and publishers are seeing their work fed into AI models which then produce imitations that take employment and earning opportunities from the original creators.
Bell Labs, the once-famed research arm of AT&T, celebrated the centennial of its founding last year. In its heyday, starting in the 1940s, the lab created a cascade of inventions, including the transistor, information theory and an enduring computer software language. The labs' digital DNA is in our smartphones, social media and chatbot conversations. Every hour of your day has a bit of Bell Labs in it, observed Jon Gertner, author of The Idea Factory, a history of the storied research center.
Last month I sat with the operations manager of a 40-person London firm and watched her spend an entire morning copying order data from one spreadsheet into another. She'd done this every Friday for two years. Nobody had questioned it because that's just how we do things. UK workers waste 11.3 billion hours a year on administrative tasks like emailing, scheduling, and data entry, according to research from Dropbox.
The UK is entering a pivotal phase in the evolution of its digital economy as artificial intelligence (AI) shifts from experimental innovation to mainstream dependency. Platforms such as ChatGPT now attract hundreds of millions of weekly active users worldwide, while Microsoft 365 Copilot has been rapidly adopted across the enterprise landscape, with nearly 70% of Fortune 500 companies integrating it into daily workflows.
LNER has unveiled the name and interior design of a new fleet of long-distance trains, which will be the first to carry the new Great British Railways branding when it launches in a few years time. LNER says demand on its East Coast Mainline route has continued to grow since the pandemic, with more than 24 million passengers travelling in 2024-25.
Today marks the start of fashion shows, presentations, and parties filled with the city's most stylish individuals. Joseph returns to the runway for the first time since 2017, while LFW staples Simone Rocha, Erdem, and Burberry continue to be hotly anticipated. But what gets industry folk excited about the shows in the big smoke isn't just big names. London has always been an incubator for young design talent, as Jonathan Anderson, Grace Wales Bonner, and Stephen Daley all started their respective brands in the city.
The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) will create a "pipeline" of projects meeting readiness criteria, offering a "concierge-style" service to help the developers navigate UK planning, regulations, and secure private investment. DESNZ says emerging nuclear technologies like small modular reactors (SMRs) can be prefabricated in factories, enabling faster, cheaper assembly using skilled jobs across multiple regions. These reactors can provide clean energy to the grid or directly to industrial users, it claims.
The new trains are the first of a fleet of 94 new trains being built in Yorkshire at the moment, and will eventually replace the Piccadilly line's existing 50-year old rolling stock. However, before passengers can ride the new trains, they need hundreds of hours of testing and assurance that they will work as expected. And testing has been underway ever since the first train arrived in London last year.
Electrical retailer AO has upgraded its networks to accelerate its business with informed decision-making, securely connecting a diverse range of devices and streamlining IT operations across all 26 of its offices and logistics centres across the UK. AO describes itself as the UK's most trusted electrical retailer, and is known for its home appliances, consumer electronics and mobile phones. The firm started life in 2000 as part of a £1 bet by founder John Roberts on his mission to sell electrical appliances online.
A pair of former Dyson engineers have raised millions of pounds to bring a battery-powered electric boiler to market, positioning it as a lower-cost, lower-disruption alternative to heat pumps for millions of UK homes. Wiltshire-based Luthmore was founded in 2022 by Craig Wilkinson and Martin Gutkowski, both ex-Dyson engineers who previously worked together on projects including the vacuum maker's abandoned electric car programme.
As we settle into 2026, London's economic landscape suggests a definitive answer. The city is witnessing a profound transformation in how services are consumed, driven by a population that has become increasingly comfortable with a digital-first existence. From financial management to high-end entertainment, the demand for seamless, instant, and secure online services has reached unprecedented levels, reshaping the commercial priorities of businesses across Greater London.
