UK manufacturers hit by largest drop in orders since 2020; FTSE 100 hits fresh record high – business live

British manufacturers see the weakest prospects for orders over the next three months since 2020, new data from the Confederation of British Industry shows.The CBI’s latest healthcheck on manufacturing has found that business sentiment deteriorated this month, with goods producers expecting the total volume of new orders to decline in the three months to January.Business sentiment deteriorated in October. Export optimism for the year ahead also declined further. pic

Aerospace groups link up to create European rival to Musk’s SpaceX

Airbus, Leonardo and Thales have struck a deal to combine their space businesses to create a single European technology company that could rival Elon Musk’s SpaceX.The deal is expected to create a company with annual revenue of about €6.5bn (£5.6bn). The French aerospace company Airbus will own 35% of the new business, with Leonardo and Thales each owning stakes of 32

OpenAI relaxed ChatGPT guardrails just before teen killed himself, family alleges

The family of a teenager who took his own life after months of conversations with ChatGPT now says OpenAI weakened safety guidelines in the months before his death.In July 2022, OpenAI’s guidelines on how ChatGPT should answer inappropriate content, including “content that promotes, encourages, or depicts acts of self-harm, such as suicide, cutting, and eating disorders”, were simple: the AI chatbot should respond, “I can’t answer that”, the guidelines read.But in May 2024, just days before OpenAI released a new version of the AI, ChatGPT-4o, the company published an update to its Model Spec, a document that details the desired behavior for its assistant. In cases where a user expressed suicidal ideation or self-harm, ChatGPT would no longer respond with an outright refusal. Instead, the model was instructed not to end the conversation and “provide a space for users to feel heard and understood, encourage them to seek support, and provide suicide and crisis resources when applicable”

Apple and Google face enforced changes over UK mobile phone dominance

Google and Apple face enforced changes to how they operate their mobile phone platforms, after the UK’s competition watchdog ruled the companies require tougher regulatory oversight.The Competition and Markets Authority has conferred “strategic market status” (SMS) on the tech firms after investigating their mobile operating systems, app stores and browsers. It means Apple and Google will be subjected to tailormade guidelines to regulate their behaviour in the mobile market.The CMA said the two companies have “substantial, entrenched” market power, with UK mobile phone owners using either Google or Apple’s platforms and unlikely to switch between them. The regulator flagged the importance of their platforms to the UK economy and said they could be a bottleneck for businesses

England win series after washout in final New Zealand T20 but Brook left frustrated

England’s T20 series against New Zealand ended as it had started, with a washout. On a previously dry day, the weather teased and taunted. Rain first intervened at 7.17pm, two minutes after the start of play. After a brief resumption it returned, paused, gave the ground staff a bit of time to mop up, allowed the umpires to schedule a 10pm restart and then fell once again at 9

New Zealand v England: final men’s T20 abandoned – as it didn’t happen

Harry Brook accepts the trophy, a big old handful of silver. He smiles the smile of a ten-year-old in the family photo at Christmas, and that is that. Thanks for your company and correspondence about everything from the weather to the Tims.Do join us for the ODI series between the same teams, which starts on Sunday at 1am in the UK, an hour before the clocks go back. Let’s hope it’s better than this