While traders put the share price fall down to technical selling, noting there had been a small degree of institutional selling, they believed BT would have few problems in raising the money. "I don't think it [the rights issue] will fail, on the basis that it's a landmark development for the whole market as well as for BT," said one analyst who did not want to be named. BT had to launch the rescue three for 10 rights issue at 300p apiece to help reduce its debts. The issue, the largest ever undertaken in the UK, is not being underwritten.Sir Peter Bonfield, BT's chief executive, and Philip Hampton, finance director, are on a tour of the US to market the rights issue. The management team will then fly to Europe on a similar exercise. BT investors were able to start selling the rights to their stock on Monday as BT's shares began trading on an "ex-rights" basis for the first time..
Nord Anglia Education has clinched a landmark contract to run a failing Surrey secondary school in the first deal of its kind. Nord Anglia Education has clinched a landmark contract to run a failing Surrey secondary school in the first deal of its kind. The move, announced yesterday, allows the quoted education services specialist to run the school on a long-term basis, a ground-breaking contract for a private sector company. Although it is not clear how many more such contracts might follow, educationalists yesterday said that the matter was too sensitive to be aired during a general election campaign. "The 400,000 teachers who are mainly Labour voters would not like the party to come out and say that private companies will be running a lot of schools in future," said one industry source.Nord Anglia was yesterday selected as preferred bidder by Surrey County Council to manage Abbeylands School, in Addlestone, for seven years.
No figure was put on the value of the contract but it is believed a school of its size would have an annual budget of about £500,000.Kevin McNeany, executive chairman of Nord Anglia, said: "We see this contract as the front-runner of things to come."The company said that while Abbeylands is performing increasingly well academically, it is experiencing "severe difficulty" in attracting pupils.Nord Anglia will seek specialist status for Abbeylands, turning it into a school focused on business and enterprise.. T-Online, the German internet service provider, is believed to be interested in the European portal business of its US counterpart Excite Home. The talks have so far been largely exploratory, and T-Online a unit of Deutsche Telekom had not yet decided whether to open full-scale negotiations. T-Online, the German internet service provider, is believed to be interested in the European portal business of its US counterpart Excite Home. The talks have so far been largely exploratory, and T-Online a unit of Deutsche Telekom had not yet decided whether to open full-scale negotiations. In April, the managing director of Excite Europe said he had received approaches that could lead to a sale of the company. Evan Rudowski said a deal could potentially be done for just Excite UK, which is 42 per cent owned by British Telecommunications , or the entire European operation worth somewhere between $50m-$100m (£35m-£70m).It is believed that other suitors have also approached Excite Home, and it was unclear whether the T-Online talks would result in a deal. Italian Internet service provider Tiscali and France's Wanadoo are other potential buyers.For T-Online, the deal would extend its reach across Europe and give it valuable content as it seeks to improve margins and reduce its dependency on the low-yielding internet access business.
