Latest news with #GarethWilliams
Scotsman
3 days ago
- Business
- Scotsman
SWURF secures follow on investment and boosts board with industry heavyweights to fuel UK and European expansion
Remote work platform transforming hospitality venues into thriving community workspaces gears up for rapid growth. Sign up to our daily newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Edinburgh News, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Edinburgh based startup SWURF has landed a six-figure investment and appointed three heavyweight industry leaders to its board, signalling a bold new phase of growth across the UK and Europe. This latest investment round includes follow-on funding from existing backer Gareth Williams, co-founder of Skyscanner, reinforcing his continued belief in the platform's mission and potential. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Joining as Chair of the Board is Alison Grieve, the award-winning founder of G-Hold and a recognised expert in product innovation and international scaling. Also stepping up is Scott Leckie, SWURF's former Fractional CTO, who now takes a permanent board seat to steer the company's tech evolution. In addition, Daniel Rodgers, founder of Scottish success story QikServe and a leader in tech innovation and strategic development, joins the board as Non-Executive Director. SWURF Board The fresh funding, backed by the Techscaler programme, Scottish Enterprise, and private investors, will supercharge SWURF's rollout. The company is also laying the groundwork for a £1 million raise later this year to support further global expansion. Nikki Gibson, CEO and Co-Founder of SWURF, said: 'With Alison guiding our international rollout, Scott shaping our tech strategy, and Daniel bringing a proven track record in tech innovation, strategic development, and digital transformation, SWURF is positioned to grow with purpose and precision. Their leadership is a game-changer as we take SWURF to new markets and new heights.' Launched during the pandemic, SWURF connects remote and hybrid professionals with underused hospitality spaces, from cafés and hotels to co-working hubs, turning them into vibrant, off-peak workspaces. Unlike traditional venue apps, SWURF builds community, offering exclusive perks and a growing calendar of co-working events. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Data collected from SWURF indicates that the platform has generated an impressive £1.8 million in revenue for host partners, while building a user base of over 11,000 and activating more than 300 venues across the UK. Alison Grieve, Chair of the Board at SWURF, said: 'In an economic environment where both hospitality and commercial property sectors are seeking new models of resilience, SWURF is targeting a fast-evolving segment of the flexible work economy. This next phase of funding will help us transform more everyday venues into productive, community-driven workspaces, powered by technology and a hospitality-first mindset.' Daniel Rodgers, Non-Executive Director at SWURF, added: 'SWURF solves a real pain point for me. When travelling, it's often difficult to find welcoming spaces to work. I am also passionate about supporting hospitality to find new markets and opportunities. Swurfers typically spend £15–£30 per visit. By extending traditional service windows, hospitality operators can tap into this community and create incremental revenue that supports profitability and reduces waste.' With over 35 million digital nomads globally, and rising demand for flexible, community-led workspaces, SWURF is perfectly positioned to lead the charge in the future of work, while helping hospitality venues thrive. To learn more about SWURF, visit or contact [email protected].
Scotsman
3 days ago
- Business
- Scotsman
SWURF secures follow on investment and boosts board with industry heavyweights to fuel UK and European expansion
Remote work platform transforming hospitality venues into thriving community workspaces gears up for rapid growth. Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Edinburgh based startup SWURF has landed a six-figure investment and appointed three heavyweight industry leaders to its board, signalling a bold new phase of growth across the UK and Europe. This latest investment round includes follow-on funding from existing backer Gareth Williams, co-founder of Skyscanner, reinforcing his continued belief in the platform's mission and potential. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Joining as Chair of the Board is Alison Grieve, the award-winning founder of G-Hold and a recognised expert in product innovation and international scaling. Also stepping up is Scott Leckie, SWURF's former Fractional CTO, who now takes a permanent board seat to steer the company's tech evolution. In addition, Daniel Rodgers, founder of Scottish success story QikServe and a leader in tech innovation and strategic development, joins the board as Non-Executive Director. SWURF Board The fresh funding, backed by the Techscaler programme, Scottish Enterprise, and private investors, will supercharge SWURF's rollout. The company is also laying the groundwork for a £1 million raise later this year to support further global expansion. Nikki Gibson, CEO and Co-Founder of SWURF, said: 'With Alison guiding our international rollout, Scott shaping our tech strategy, and Daniel bringing a proven track record in tech innovation, strategic development, and digital transformation, SWURF is positioned to grow with purpose and precision. Their leadership is a game-changer as we take SWURF to new markets and new heights.' Launched during the pandemic, SWURF connects remote and hybrid professionals with underused hospitality spaces, from cafés and hotels to co-working hubs, turning them into vibrant, off-peak workspaces. Unlike traditional venue apps, SWURF builds community, offering exclusive perks and a growing calendar of co-working events. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Data collected from SWURF indicates that the platform has generated an impressive £1.8 million in revenue for host partners, while building a user base of over 11,000 and activating more than 300 venues across the UK. Alison Grieve, Chair of the Board at SWURF, said: 'In an economic environment where both hospitality and commercial property sectors are seeking new models of resilience, SWURF is targeting a fast-evolving segment of the flexible work economy. This next phase of funding will help us transform more everyday venues into productive, community-driven workspaces, powered by technology and a hospitality-first mindset.' Daniel Rodgers, Non-Executive Director at SWURF, added: 'SWURF solves a real pain point for me. When travelling, it's often difficult to find welcoming spaces to work. I am also passionate about supporting hospitality to find new markets and opportunities. Swurfers typically spend £15–£30 per visit. By extending traditional service windows, hospitality operators can tap into this community and create incremental revenue that supports profitability and reduces waste.' With over 35 million digital nomads globally, and rising demand for flexible, community-led workspaces, SWURF is perfectly positioned to lead the charge in the future of work, while helping hospitality venues thrive.
Rhyl Journal
4 days ago
- General
- Rhyl Journal
Bodelwyddan school given award for promoting Welsh language
Ysgol Y Faenol has achieved the Cymraeg Campus Silver Award. Earlier this week, the school proudly received a certificate from Gareth Williams, of the Denbighshire Advisory Team, on behalf of Lynne Neagle MS, Welsh Government's cabinet secretary for education. The school's Welsh co-ordinator, Lisa Kay, said: 'It has been a significant journey since achieving bronze in 2019. 'And this success would not have been possible without the dedication of our fantastic Criw Cymraeg and the continued support from the whole school community. A pupil at Ysgol Y Faenol with the school's Cymraeg Campus Silver Award (Image: Submitted) 'Diolch to everyone who has contributed to this achievement as we continue our journey to promote the Welsh language. 'We are excited to begin working towards the gold award.' One of the school's pupils added: 'We are so proud to use more Welsh every day in school. It feels great to help everyone enjoy the language.'
Telegraph
5 days ago
- Science
- Telegraph
Why it's really the British we have to thank for the atom bomb
Manhattan, Mayson, Maud. One of these is synonymous with the race to build an atomic bomb during the first half of the 1940s. But we ought to have heard of all three, argues Gareth Williams in his book The Impossible Bomb – a pacy and potent mix of wartime politics and high technology. Williams sets out to recover the role of British scientists in building the bomb, but there's no triumphalism here. Pinned to a noticeboard in his study, Williams tells us, is a black lapel badge bearing the logo of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Now an emeritus professor at the University of Bristol, Williams grew up in the post-war years fearing that he might see a 'mushroom cloud boiling up into the sky above the rooftops'. Williams was motivated to write this book after discovering some declassified government papers pertaining to a secretive 'Maud Committee'. He later heard a scientist who'd worked on the British hydrogen bomb make a striking claim: that without Britain's help, the United States wouldn't have been able to create a working atomic bomb until after the Second World War ended. This isn't, it must be said, a new idea. As Williams accepts, it was put forward by a war correspondent named Ronald Clark back in 1961. But myth-making in America about the birth of the nuclear age has long sidelined British figures, and still does. American Prometheus (2005), the Kai Bird and Martin J Sherwin biography on which the Oscar-winning film Oppenheimer (2023) was based, all but reduces the British contribution to a man hosting a dinner party at Los Alamos. After some helpful preliminaries on the history of atomic physics, The Impossible Bomb begins in the 1930s, as trepidation among scientists is growing. The destructive potential of splitting the atom is dawning on them, just as Europe appears once again to be moving towards war. The Hungarian-born physicist Leo Szilard begs colleagues to stop publishing their ideas on nuclear fission, and asks the editor of Physical Review to record the date of manuscript submissions on the subject – thereby preserving claims to originality – then lock them away in a drawer. When these efforts meet with mixed results, Szilard helps to compose a letter to US president Franklin D Roosevelt in 1939 – co-signed by Albert Einstein – urging that America try to beat Nazi Germany to the bomb. This moment is often treated as the origin of the Manhattan Project. But Williams argues that most scientists in the United States were, at this point, unconvinced that an atomic weapon was feasible in the near-term. They were more interested in developing radar, and were confident that if America were drawn into the war, their conventional forces would see them through. In the early years of the conflict, the most promising work on a bomb was happening in Britain. Enter Maud, a committee formed in Britain in the spring of 1940. (Though its name was written in capitals as MAUD, and thus was usually taken to be an acronym, the letters didn't stand for anything.) It came about in response to a document created by two expatriate German physicists working at the University of Birmingham: Otto Frisch and Rudolf Peierls. The Frisch-Peierls memorandum sketched out the theory behind a 'super-bomb', to be created using uranium-235. By the summer, Williams tells us, Maud involved four universities (Cambridge, Oxford, Liverpool, Birmingham) and boasted five Nobel laureates, including James Chadwick and John Cockcroft. In its final report, in 1941, the committee concluded that a super-bomb could be made in two years: great excitement followed, and an organisation was formed to work on the project, with the usefully abstract name of the 'Tube Alloys Directorate'. Williams excels at interweaving the technical challenges of the subsequent months with the vicissitudes of politics. We find Churchill and Roosevelt wary of one another, at first, on the question of atomic co-operation. 'Mayson' was Roosevelt's proposal for Anglo-American partnership; but for a time, at least, Churchill wanted a British bomb, independent of the Americans. It wasn't to be. American help turned out to be indispensable in building a 'super-bomb'. In the end, British scientists had to set aside their own work on Tube Alloys and travel to the USA – to Los Alamos, Berkeley and Oak Ridge – to help on what became the Manhattan Project. Chadwick was among around 84 British scientists making the journey, and neither of the bombs detonated over Japan in August 1945, concludes Williams, would have been possible without them. Through Frisch and Peierls, we experience the profound anxiety of Jewish refugees living in Britain during these years; they were only too aware of how they would likely fare if the Nazis won the race to build a bomb. Across the water in Germany, great minds such as Werner Heisenberg were hard at work trying to make that happen. We encounter British and American spies working around the clock to ascertain the state of the Nazi effort, and to thwart it wherever they could. The Americans considered abducting Heisenberg during one of his research trips to Switzerland. Williams's labours in the archive have been considerable, but the result is a significant contribution to our understanding of 'the most significant international collaboration of the 20th century'. It's eminently readable, too: to follow the development of nuclear weapons requires the explanation of plenty of science, but Williams succeeds, deploying vivid analogies and simple sketches. A spherical aluminium container for a globe of uranium oxide, constantly turning in order to keep heavy water circulating, is an especially memorable one. Williams compares it to 'an oversized glitterball that someone had forgotten to switch off after the last dance'. ★★★★★
Daily Mirror
12-07-2025
- Business
- Daily Mirror
Reform UK leader moans about Eurostar skipping stations without mentioning why
The cross-channel train service used to stop at both Ashford International and Ebbsfleet International stations in Kent - but company bosses have a good reason why they stopped A Reform UK council leader moaned about Eurostar not stopping at two train stations - but didn't mention that a major reason they don't is down to Brexit. The cross-channel train service used to stop at both Ashford International and Ebbsfleet International stations in Kent. But services stopped during the pandemic and never restarted. Eurostar bosses have said they want to bring the services back to Kent, but list Brexit among the main reasons they can't afford to. This week, Kent Council's Reform UK leader Linden Kemkaran gave a speech outlining her priorities for the region. She pledged to host an event to lure the train firm back to the region - promising to serve 'delicious Kentish food and wine, and show Eurostar exactly what they are missing.' Eurostar is due to reconsider whether to restart services stopping at the two stations this year. But in 2023, the firm's General Secretary, Gareth Williams, said new Brexit border checks 'pose a serious risk' to the company's business. Even passengers who use e-gates at the main St Pancras hub need to have their passport stamped separately, causing huge queues at the station and forcing some trains to run with seats unsold. Mr Williams said the pressure on border capacity had 'forced some really difficult commercial choices.'
