Total Rok redundancies hits 2,600.

Following a collapse in the sale of some parts of its business, construction firm Rok has announced that a further 1,800 jobs have been cut. Rok plc and Rok Building Limited were put into administration earlier this month after findings showed the company had failed in controlling its financial and operational aspects.

After an initial flurry of interest in the purchase of the maintenance division across the UK and the company construction business in Scotland, buyers lost interest following a review of Rok’s overall cost.

PwC administrator Rob Hunt said: “Regrettably, the redundancies made today were necessary as it became clear in the last 24 hours that we were not going to be able to find a purchaser for these parts of the Group.”

He added: “Operations cannot continue and hence we have had to take steps to close both the maintenance and improvements division as well as the Scottish construction division.”

Rok is still looking to sell its English construction and social housing division, which employs 500 people.

Cheaper fuel and rising passenger numbers lead to Easyjet profits soaring.

The company reported profits of £154m since last September, tripling the £55m revenue made in 2009. Over the past year, passenger numbers increased by 8% bringing the total to 49 million, and as fuel costs dropped by 9%, the company saw a serious overhaul in takings.

Chief Executive, Carolyn McCall said: “We see clear opportunities for Easyjet to continue to take market share as charter traffic continues to decline, as weaker short-haul carriers retrench or fail and as new infrastructure capacity comes on stream.”

As well as these benefits, Easyjet is profiting from more and more European passengers opting for the British preference of flying via budget airlines.

McCall added the company would see added competition in the next year as budget airlines strive to win passengers in the new market.

The company also revealed its intentions to pay a dividend to shareholders in 2012.

CBI announces new leader as John Cridland.

The Confederation of British Industry announced ‘veteran’ John Cridland had been appointed as the new director general. Mr Cridland has worked within the company for many years and was passed over for the job when he previously applied five years ago.

Taking on the £310,000-a-year post, Mr Cridland recognised the difficult time ahead for businesses. He said: “There are many challenges ahead in getting the economy growing and no one thinks that securing the UK’s economic future will be easy, but business people across the country are rolling up their sleeves and getting on with the job.”

Insiders have welcomed the news after fears a newcomer would disrupt internal affairs.

Former CBI director general, Lord Jones said appointing Mr Cridland would be beneficial to the business world, adding that his “knowledge, experience, popularity, contacts and prodigious hard work and application to the task will make an enormous contribution to the country in the hard years ahead.”

Google has seen setbacks following Fox TV turndown.

Google TV, launched in October this year, allows viewers to view websites and internet video on their television sets but after four major broadcast networks failed to agree in allowing access to their content, things aren’t looking good.

Following in the footsteps of ABC, CBC and NBC, American TV network Fox, has denied Google TV the right to air their programmes. With fears an online channel would mean advertising revenue would suffer, Fox refused Google in preference of TV adverts.

Reports have shown that Google were vague in their intentions to make profit from the venture and the major networks aren’t convinced.

Despite the recent setback, Google has remained confident, product manager Rishi Chandra said: “The web is a technology and it’s not unheard of whenever there is a new technology that a lot of incumbents in the space are trying to understand what that technology is going to mean for them.”

GE purchases 25,000 electric cars in a bid to boost the market.

In an attempt to “push the emerging technology and profit from its widespread rollout”, General Electric will invest in the fleet over the next five years. Manufacturer of electric charging stations, GE will convert at least half its 30,000 fleet to electric.

Beginning this month, GE hopes the purchase will lead to “wide-scale electric adoption and generate growth for its businesses.” Believing we are on the verge of an electric vehicle ‘boom’, GE will use the first 12,000 Chevrolet Volts as company cars for corporate customers.

GE Chief Executive and chairman Jeff Immelt said: “By electrifying our own fleet, we will accelerate the adoption curve, drive scale and move electric vehicles from anticipation to action.”

Predicting that the investment could lead to $500million in revenue over the next five years through sales of its electric-car recharger and other products, GE also said the purchase would not “reduce the number of Volts available to the public.”

FSA says UK investment firms must have mobile phone calls recorded starting next year.

Currently, landline phone conversations and e-mails regarding orders or transactions must be recorded but the Financial Services Authority says this must be extended to company mobile phones starting next November.

In a bid to “promote cleaner markets”, the FSA hopes to get rid of insider trading and warned steps should be taken to ensure private phones are not used by traders to carry out transactions.

The FSA said: “Removing the exemption will provide an extra source of voice and electronic communication evidence, which can be used to help us counter the key priority of market abuse and increase the probability of successful enforcement.”

With phone conversations recorded and stored for six months, the plans would mean the FSA could demand to hear the recordings at any time, minimising market abuse.

Although a positive step for safer business, financial firms have criticised the proposals branding them too expensive - with a start up cost of around £11m, companies would see figures reaching £18m annually to keep the plans running.

Following the Gulf of Mexico crisis, BP is finally out of the red

The oil giant recorded a massive loss of nearly £11bn in their report of the last quarter after the monumental costs of the oil spill disaster.

After writing off over £20bn of the charges from the crisis in July, BP has reported they are back in profit after making revenues of £1.1bn this quarter.

The newest figures comes after a £4.8bn charge to the oil spill fund, proving revenue for the firm would have been higher still. 

Although a positive step for BP, it is still disappointing when compared with the £3.13bn profit the company saw in the same period for 2009.

Chief Executive, Bob Dudley said the results showed “good progress” for the giant adding: “This strong operating performance shows the determination of everyone at BP to move the company forward and rebuild confidence after the terrible events of the past six months.”