Sponsored by
Even lunch has to be sacrificed when green shoots appear
I SUPPOSE it is a sign of increasing activity in the business world when a leading corporate lawyer cancels lunch.
This happened to me yesterday when Jonathan Procter, head of corporate at the Leeds office of DLA Piper, called to apologise for pulling out of our meeting.
(For a business journalist, lunches with contacts are an essential part of the intelligence-gathering process and I always enjoy catching up with old contacts and making new acquaintances.)
My ears pricked up when he told me the reason for cancellation: his workload. He said his department is "exponentially busier" now than in January and February.
I pushed for some more information and asked the obvious question... why?
Because confidence is returning. His subsequent remarks are interesting so I will share them.
Said Mr Procter: "It is the confidence to take advantage of opportunities that are coming into the market.
"Whether a sector is being hit hard or not, you tend to find there are some companies that have a strong position within the sector that enables them to take advantage of opportunities that arise. That's what we are seeing now.
"In January and February, those same opportunities would have been turned down by the strongest in the sector because no-one had any feeling for how the recession was going to develop.
"Now there's a view. Now the entrepreneurial acquisitive firms with funding are seeing opportunities. Sellers are much more realistic about price. In some companies financial pressures are causing people to plan the sale of non-core subsidiaries."
In a further sign that things might be looking up, Mr Procter said he is seeing more fundraising activity through rights issues and placings or revised banking arrangements to create warchests or, in corporatespeak, "acquisition finance facilities".
These are to bankroll "opportunistic acqusitions caused by shake-outs in the recession" which are at "the vanguard of more transactional activity".
Sectors where there will be potential acquisitions and fundraising for acquisitions include healthcare ("active"), support services, manufacturing, travel and leisure, financial services ("potentially very active") and property ("less active").
And all that from a phone call to cancel lunch!
LAST week, I wrote about how the recession is now hitting the public sector, with employers cutting jobs, especially in local government.
It generated a strong response from a Yorkshire-based partner at one of the Big Four accountancy firms, who argues that public spending is a big issue for all business.
My story carried a warning from the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development, which said the current job-shedding "will look like a walk in the park as the drive to balance the books gets under way in earnest".
As we know, Great Britain is sitting on a massive pile of debt and the annual budget deficit is forecast to hit 175bn in the next two years.
Radical action is needed to bring us into the black, but whether this Government has the appetite for implementing huge cuts across the enlarged state – where much of its support lies – remains to be seen.
Over to Iain Hasdell, the government advisory partner at KPMG in Leeds.
He said: "The reality is that we have had 10 years of public sector growth which was affordable given the growth in the wider economy.
"Now the challenge is to reduce the cost of the public sector and at the same time to improve its productivity. And if we do not, taxation in the real economy will need to be increased still further and stay high for the medium term to finance the public sector.
"This in turn could then dampen the wider economic recovery by lowering incentives for enterprise and business. So it is a mainstream business issue."
IT might seem crazy, foolhardy or brave, but now really could be the best time to start a new business in years.
Good people are cheap at the moment, there are more of them on the market and premises cost less as landlords are lowering rents to attract custom.
You can get more bang for your buck in most things, if you bargain hard enough.
There is also a lot of advice and support available to start-ups so my message would be to do your research and take advantage of what is out there.
You will need a good idea, of course. That's the most important part.
And that is free.
Email to a friend
Print this page
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Yorkshire
Wednesday 23 May 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: 11 C to 24 C
Wind Speed: 12 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Cloudy
Temperature: 9 C to 22 C
Wind Speed: 12 mph
Wind direction: North east
