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Josh Western and Andrew Bacon set up their company Space Forge last year, they started off in a garage with not much else. Today, the two Cardiff-based entrepreneurs have a staff of 25 and are now planning further expansion after raising £7.6m of international seed-funding.

The financing should allow the company to start a remarkable aerospace endeavor: deploying satellites in which new alloys, medicines and semiconductors can be manufactured in outer space and then brought back to Earth. The first missions are planned for the end of 2022.

“Earth is a wonderful place to live on but terrible for manufacturing so many things,” said Western. “You have to fight gravity and the dense atmosphere while trying not to cause pollution. But in space you have no gravity to interfere with the mixing of materials, while you have a pure vacuum and no atmospheric pollution. And you also turn your instruments … Read more

McDonald’s has opened the firm’s first UK net zero carbon restaurant. The building is powered by wind turbines and solar panels and is located in Market Drayton, Shropshire.

The building’s cladding was made using recycled IT equipment and household goods, while signs were created from used coffee beans. Insulation for the restaurant is provided by sheep wool.

The fast-food company said it would be used as a “blueprint” for other sites and work has started to roll it out.

‘Net zero’ means not adding to the amount of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere.

McDonald’s new build is the first restaurant in the UK that is due to be verified as net zero emissions for construction using the UK Green Building Council’s (UKGBC’s) net zero carbon buildings framework.

The problems of … Read more

Just Eat has entered the fast grocery delivery market by partnering with Asda in its first venture with a supermarket in the UK.

From January, Just Eat customers will be able to add a range of products to their baskets starting with five Asda stores; the exact locations are to be announced in the new year.

“We live in an on-demand world,” said Andrew Kenny, the UK managing director of Just Eat. “We want to make sure we are getting our customers the food they want, when they want, when they want it. Our tie-up with Asda means we can help people access everything from store cupboard essentials to fresh groceries in a matter of minutes,” Kenny expressed.

Just Eat follows in the footsteps of its competitors, which already have fast delivery deals with some of the UK’s largest supermarkets.

Best-known for restaurant and fast food delivery, Just Eat said … Read more

Ocado has promised the “best ever Christmas” is ahead for its food retail joint venture with Marks & Spencer thanks to booming demand for online grocery delivery.

Customer order numbers each week were up 9% in the 13 weeks to 28 November compared with 2020 thanks to a 22% rise in active customer numbers, according to a trading update.

Ocado has been one of the winners during the coronavirus pandemic, as lockdowns prompted a wave of customers to order groceries online for the first time.

The rise in orders has been accompanied by pressures such as a shortage of workers and capacity constraints as Ocado races to build more warehouses to keep up with demands of consumers. The company said it would spend £50m more than they expected on investments in order to stay ahead.

The pressures meant that retail revenues from Ocado and Marks & Spencer’s retail joint venture … Read more

The toy making giant LEGO said it will invest more than $1bn (£760m) in their new manufacturing project, which will be near the country’s main business hub of Ho Chi Minh City.

This will be the Danish company’s second factory in Asia after it opened a plant in China five years ago. Lego has seen double-digit growth in the region since 2019.

“We are very grateful for the support of the Vietnamese government in helping us achieve our ambition to build our first carbon neutral factory,” LEGO’s chief operations officer Carsten Rasmussen said in a statement.

Construction on the site is due to start next year, with plans to match its energy consumption with solar panels on its roof and on a nearby farm.

Production at the plant is set to begin in 2024 and is expected to create up to 4,000 jobs over the next 15 years.

It is … Read more