How would an independent Scotland fund its research?
NOW THAT we have fixed both the date and the question for the referendum on Scottish independence maybe we can expect our politicians to...
Strengths and weaknesses in Scots attitude to entrepreneurship
THE LATEST ‘Global Entrepreneurship Monitor’ (GEM) report has just been published and as usual it makes interesting reading. GEM is a...
When it comes to national trade figures should we mind the gap?
YOU KNOW these “Whatever happened to…” columns that appear in newspapers and magazines now and then. They are usually commissioned...
Economic ‘level playing field’ undermined by inequality
THOMAS FRIEDMAN STATED ‘The World is Flat’ in his bestselling book of the same name on the effects of globalisation which was first...
Lessons should be learned from Finnish approach to education
WHEN UK EDUCATION MINISTER Michael Gove appeared on the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show a few weeks ago, he remarked that every guest on the...
The evolution of espionage and hacking
A FEW WEEKS AGO I visited the global control room of a company called Akamai in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The scene could have come...
Scotland risks irrelevance after independence
A RECENT VISIT TO New Zealand gave the opportunity to observe how a small independent country exists in the modern global economy – much...
Is Google getting too nosey for its own good?
ONE OF THE MIRACLES of modern technology is undoubtedly Google, without which we might never be able to find anything on the internet....
Telecoms old guard need to show their mettle
WAY BACK IN 1953, a Canadian businessman called Roy Thomson rescued the then troubled Scotsman newspaper group by buying a majority share...
EIS shortcomings stymie creation of larger businesses
IN A WORLD in which economic growth has largely stalled, Governments are keen on anything which can encourage new companies to be set up....
Is the corporation tax break gamble one worth taking?
WHEN I WAS on the board of Scottish Enterprise (SE) we received regular updates on the amount of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) which...
Scots miss out on exclusive ‘Festival of Ideas’
A NEW EVENT has joined the ranks of Edinburgh’s summer festivals. It is probably the most intelligent, exclusive, and international of...
Politicians must engage in University funding debate
WHILE WE IN SCOTLAND have been having our wee election, the UK Government and the universities in England have been trying to sort out...
Don’t leave us languishing ‘in the Dark Ages’
SIR HUMPHREY APPLELBY, in the classic sitcom Yes, Minister said that it was always best to “dispose of the difficult bit in the title. It...
Economic policy gives rise to ‘ghost towns’
THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT made quite a fuss over the recent announcement that Amazon has decided to expand its Scottish based fulfilment...
Demerged Bank of Scotland could get back to basics
I WENT TO A RECEPTION at the Bank of Scotland building at the top of The Mound recently. I hadn't been there for a while, and was...
Reports of the Web’s demise are premature
THE SEPTEMBER 2010 ISSUE of the US edition of WIRED magazine had a very striking cover. In a huge headline it pronounced: “The Web is...