Sunday May 14
This week's last-ditch rescue of Rover from the breakers' yard, and Ford's decision to stop car assembly in Britain, gives the impression that the British car industry is on its knees. Yet car production in this country has reached its highest level for almost 30 years, and several companies are pledged to invest hundreds of millions of pounds on new plant and models. So what is the true state of the British motor industry?
Lesley Curwen visits Peugeot in Coventry to find out why business there is booming and asks Ford's European boss, Nick Scheele, why he couldn't make the sums add up at Dagenham.
Nick Scheele - full interview
B2B or not B2B?
The e-commerce revolution is entering a new phase, with profound implications for the world economy. Retailing over the web had been thought to hold the key to immense fortunes for dotcom companies. But those hopes are already fading and the real promise of e-commerce is now thought to lie elsewhere. B2B - or "business to business" - is the new golden catchphrase. Many of the world's largest companies are banding together to form huge internet 'exchanges' which will be handling trillions of pounds worth of purchasing by next year. It offers big business the prospect of making huge savings on what they buy. But for their suppliers, the vast numbers of smaller companies who provide big corporations with services, materials and parts, the new technology promises a much tougher future. Nils Blythe reports.
BT: It's good to talk
When it was privatised 15 years ago, British Telecom dominated the telecoms industry in this country. Since then, its share of the telecoms market has dwindled, and there have been growing complaints that the company has been complacent and slow to embrace new technologies.
Next week BT announces its full-year profits. The company's boss, Sir Peter Bonfield, tells Maya Even why investors should ignore the critics.