January 31, 2020

Wates FM awarded contract extension with Discovery Communications

Wates FM has secured a contract extension with mass media company, Discovery Communications, to provide 24/7 critical engineering cover and fabric maintenance for two locations in Chiswick, including the organisation’s live broadcast premises. Having run for three years, the contract will be extended for a further year due to team

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How to make a housing development eco-friendly

The requirement to make new housing developments eco-friendly is now stronger than ever as the reality of climate change becomes more widely accepted, and the need to tackle it is perceived as being more urgent. These are not the only reasons, as an eco-friendly house will by definition also be

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Five Tech Developments Shaping the Future of Business Presentations

Technological advancements and increased digitalisation are providing businesses with a greater choice of innovative presentation techniques than ever before. From AR to colour psychology, new ideas are constantly informing how businesses present their ideas. Let’s take a look at the best presentation technologies out there, that are predicted to enhance

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Latest Issue
Issue 323 : Dec 2024

January 31, 2020

Wates FM awarded contract extension with Discovery Communications

Wates FM has secured a contract extension with mass media company, Discovery Communications, to provide 24/7 critical engineering cover and fabric maintenance for two locations in Chiswick, including the organisation’s live broadcast premises. Having run for three years, the contract will be extended for a further year due to team resilience, the application of innovation and continued excellence in fabric service. James Gregg, Managing Director of Wates FM, commented: “Our contract extension with Discovery Communications, is a huge testament to the expertise of our team and our position as a trusted and reliable FM partner to our clients. “Wates FM is heading into 2020 with a very healthy work pipeline but of course our growth must be steady and sustainable to ensure that we continue to deliver exceptional services to our clients, both existing and new.” Formerly operating as Wates Smartspace, Wates FM forms part of Wates Property Services alongside the Group’s Living Space business and currently manages over 350 commercial properties.

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Innovative funding drives growth at UK housebuilder and fast-tracks property ventures

An innovative funding arrangement is helping to accelerate the growth of an award-winning housebuilder and fast-track property ventures across the North of England. MAVEN Bonds is providing short-term finance to County Durham developer Homes by Carlton, to drive forward several property schemes around the northern regions. The Newton Aycliffe-headquartered firm recently used a £300,000 short term development finance loan to fast-track construction work on its Cathedral Gates development in Chilton. Situated eight miles from Durham City centre, the scheme comprises 14 spacious plots with a mix of three and four-bed detached and semi-detached homes. It has proved popular with ten of the plots already sold – giving the construction team the confidence to accelerate the building programme. MAVEN Bonds has been designed to provide investors with the opportunity to diversify their investment portfolio by providing loans to property development projects that offer the potential to generate higher tax-free returns compared to mainstream investment options. Simon Lenney, independent chairman of MAVEN Bonds, said: MAVEN Bonds focuses on two main areas; firstly to provide investors with the opportunity to invest into well structured property projects. Secondly, to provide experienced developers and real estate professionals such as Homes By Carlton with access to loans of between £200,000 and £2million.  Having completed this first short term development loan, MAVEN Bonds has provided a separate £800,000 bridging loan to allow Homes by Carlton to acquire land for new homes site at Thorpe Thewles, in Stockton-on-Tees, Teesside. The developer is aiming to get building underway soon at the Thorpe Paddocks, a residential scheme that will see 31 luxury family homes built at Thorpe Thewles. Simon Walker, managing director of Homes By Carlton, said: “I’m really pleased that we’ve managed to secure bridging and development finance with MAVEN Bonds. After we quickly sold the first ten homes at Cathedral Gates, we wanted to speed up the construction process on site and the loan enabled us to do that.  “Working with MAVEN Bonds was a pleasure; having secured the loan rapidly, we’ve been able to start construction work sooner than anticipated and we also have additional finance in place to move quickly on our Thorpe Thewles development.” Simon Lenney, independent chairman of MAVEN Bonds, said: “I’m delighted to see how the loan has enabled Homes by Carlton to press ahead on the Chilton scheme and then acquire an exciting scheme at Thorpe Thewles. This is exactly what MAVEN Bonds was set up to do – to provide quick, alternative finance that can speed up property developments and provide our investors with the potential to earn much higher returns than those currently available through traditional investment routes.” MAVEN Bonds is a joint venture between private equity firm MAVEN Capital Partners and Growth Capital Ventures (GCV).  It has been driven by rising demand for good quality housing and is a response to the lack of fast, flexible mainstream finance available to property developers and investors in many sectors such as hotels, student accommodation and residential. The bond works by providing secured loans to property developers and property development companies. Returns are generated by charging interest and fees on these loans. Both MAVEN and GCV have a strong property track record and since January 2015, the combined MAVEN and GCV advisory team have completed property transactions worth more than £300 million, leveraging over £125 million of equity in the process.  The MAVEN Bonds Investment Platform – www.mavenbonds.co.uk – has been created and developed by GCV’s inhouse software engineering team. The online investment platform has been designed to streamline the investment process and provide experienced investors with access to bonds with higher target returns than that of more mainstream investment options. For further information, visit www.mavenbonds.co.uk and https://www.homesbycarlton.com/

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How to make a housing development eco-friendly

The requirement to make new housing developments eco-friendly is now stronger than ever as the reality of climate change becomes more widely accepted, and the need to tackle it is perceived as being more urgent. These are not the only reasons, as an eco-friendly house will by definition also be cheaper to run, with reduced energy consumption meaning lower fuel bills. Eco-friendly options also suit contemporary lifestyles, being seen as providing a better-quality and more harmonious way of life, and these options also dovetail with the desire for ‘fair trade’ and more socially conscious ways of sourcing, building and inhabiting a property. What defines an eco-home? There is no one fixed standard that defines one house as eco-friendly and another as not. Although different bodies may set minimum requirements that must be reached in order to qualify, the overall reality is that the eco-friendliness of any given development will be a sliding scale. Considerations such as budget, location, intended usage and planning permission will all determine the degree to which a house can be made as eco-friendly as possible. The three goals that are traditionally set in making a development eco-friendly are reducing energy consumption, using resources and materials in a sustainable way, and promoting healthy living within the development. One could also look at how well the development harmonises with its natural environment and compensates for the ecology it is built upon. Insulation The primary factor to be considered is how best to reduce heat loss from the property and so maximise the efficiency of energy use, ultimately reducing the quantity of energy used. This is essential even if the energy is drawn from renewable sources. Consistent insulation is the key here, using natural renewable materials such as sheep’s wool as much as possible. Draught-proofing and triple glazing will also help to make a property airtight and reduce energy loss. Energy sufficiency The use of a solar battery for the provision of heating and hot water should be considered a bare minimum in terms of switching over to renewable energy sources. Setting up a whole development ‘off grid’ with its own renewable energy supply, perhaps from a mixture of wind and solar power, would be the best way to guarantee 100% self-sufficient renewable energy. The development would need to generate at least as much energy as it used. Any surplus could be stored against future needs or sold to other users. Fabric first This approach looks at minimising heat loss and energy demands through the materials used in construction. Taking this one step further, the Active House principle also looks at the use of sustainably sourced and recycled materials for construction, water consumption, emissions and resource depletion. Forestry Stewardship Council-certified timber should be used alongside natural materials such as straw bale and lime. Plastic use should be kept to a minimum, and recycled plastic used when necessary. Embodied energy The development as a whole needs to have a low carbon footprint, which means taking into account the energy used and carbon monoxide generated in the manufacture and transportation of materials, all the way down the supply chain. This ‘embodied energy’ can be up to 25% of a development’s total lifetime energy demands. Greening the house Avoid brick, concrete and tarmac drives in favour of mixed species green areas. A grass lawn alone doesn’t give much back to the local ecology, but adding daisies, wild flowers, yellow rattle, chamomile, etc., provides a more sustainable immediate eco-system that encourages insect life. Look for a similar blend to that displaced by the development. This should also be considered if adding green walls or roofs, which by their nature will support different plants to the garden or underlying plot. Exercise caution so as not to unbalance the local ecosystem by attracting different insect strains. Orientation Finally, consider which way any given property is facing. Wide, triple-glazed windows should face south in order to absorb the maximum amount of light and heat into the house, while north-facing windows should be kept to a minimum as heat can be lost through these even when fully glazed. In an airtight property with passive solar orientation, measures must also be taken to avoid over-heating – for instance, external sunshades (brise soleil) or deep overhangs. Air conditioning is also an option so long as this does not use more energy than has been saved through insulation and orientation. These methods are all ways to approach the challenge of eco-friendly developments. Often, it pays to focus either on renewable energy or fabric-first insulation, but a holistic approach that combines the two is, of course, ideal if this is feasible.

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Five Tech Developments Shaping the Future of Business Presentations

Technological advancements and increased digitalisation are providing businesses with a greater choice of innovative presentation techniques than ever before. From AR to colour psychology, new ideas are constantly informing how businesses present their ideas. Let’s take a look at the best presentation technologies out there, that are predicted to enhance presentations of the future. 1.      Virtual Reality Virtual reality gives your audience a chance to emerge themselves in your presentation. This technology has advance in an incredible rate over the past few years and is expected to keep accelerating. According to Forbes, the worldwide market for VR is expected to reach 98.4 million sales by 2023. This tech could completely transform your business presentation, at a fraction of the cost of other innovations such as AR. Creating an immersive experience, VR offers a fantastic way to tell stories that your audience will feel actively involved in. As studies have linked visualising a situation to increased memory retention, a VR presentation will stick in your audience’s memory much more than the conventional PowerPoint format. 2.      Product Demos Companies including Apple, Microsoft, and Google have paved the way when it comes to product demos. These tech giants have proved that audience’s respond far better to actually witnessing how a product works, rather than just taking the speaker’s word for it. Thanks to advanced projecting equipment, presentations can now feature a clear product demo on a large scale. Why tell people how fantastic your new product is, when you could just show them? 3.      Colour psychology Science can inform presentation techniques in unexpected ways. Colour psychology is often utilised by speakers to evoke certain emotions in their audience and help strengthen their argument. Depending on your brand, different colours are useful to use in your presentations. Blue, for example, has been proven to evoke calmness, and focus — perfect for keeping audiences engaged! Keeping up to date with recent colour trends is also vital. New visual trends tell your audience that your brand is up to date, ever improving, and modern. 4.      Audience polls  Audience interaction is integral to a successful and memorable presentation. If you can think of a way for your audience to get involved, then your presentation will capture the room’s attention. One such way is using a live audience poll. Polling apps allow your audience to have their say. They provide a great way to gather the thoughts of your audience and reinforce your points. What’s more, you can engage audiences from all around the world using polling apps such as Polleverywhere. Both international audiences and the people watching the presentation in person will feel more engaged in your presentation if they get to play a part in it. 5.      Augmented Reality Prezi, a leading presentation tool, has recently delved into the world of augmented reality, discovering what it could mean for presentations of the future. The founders aim to bring audiences “inside of a presentation using augmented reality” and they believe that AR could enhance audience engagement. AR, which has already been implemented by the likes of Snapchat and Google Pixel, creates life-like objects and customised visual environments. Like VR, it is a great tool for allowing your audience to feel involved in the presentation and interact. One example of AR used within a presentation was in a recent TED talk, in which neurologist Robert Sapolsky discussed the biology behind human nature. To illustrate one of his points, he conjured up an AR figure, which points a gun right at the speaker. This illusion captivated audiences’ attentions and became the most memorable part of the talk. All of these techniques will enhance business presentations over the next few years, improving audience engagement and creating memorable moments. Despite all the technology in the world however, it is down to you, the speaker, to deliver your presentation with authority and confidence. Practical tools are still essential to a flawless presentation. Pair these methods with innovative technologies and your audience are sure to be hooked. Article produced by a leading UK business card provider: Where The Trade Buys. Sources

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