UFO Info Week-End

Do I have any options?A The DTI Small Firms Loan Guarantee Scheme may be the answer when small firms with

Do I have any options?A The DTI Small Firms Loan Guarantee Scheme ( ) may be the answer when small firms with viable business proposals have tried and failed to get a conventional loan because of lack of security Most banks can provide business loans via this scheme. Ask your bank manager – if they are unhelpful, talk to another bank.Q I am keen to turn my passion (furniture-making) into a business and I have identified facilities and two people to employ on a part-time basis. Where can I find out about health and safety regulations?A All employers, including the self-employed, have statutory duties to ensure that their workplace is safe. The Health and Safety Executive has an excellent website with a special section for small businesses ( ).Q I own a small engineering firm and I’ve a great idea for a new product in the field of automotives. The prototype I have made works well and I feel there could be a large market.

What should I do to patent the idea?A Well done for not describing the product – you must keep your idea secret at this stage. Ask your solicitor if the idea can be patented and, if so, to recommend someone to advise on the patent process. Many people do write and submit their own patent applications but getting help at this early stage would probably be money well spent. Do visit the Patent Office website ( ).

It’s a great source of information about patents and the application process.. Jonson Cox, the chief executive of AWG, owner of Anglian Water, is hot and bothered. Not because it is approaching 25 degrees outside the group’s central London offices and he can’t find the air conditioning switch, or even because he is worried that the photographer might snap a picture of some non-Anglian Water mineral water he is drinking (it happens to be Marks & Spencer’s own brand). Cox, who joined in January, has spent the last six months dealing with a problematic legacy. AWG, he says, is now a “First Division company wanting to become a Premier League player”. Having run Yorkshire Water in the 1990s and after becoming Railtrack’s chief operating officer just before the Hatfield train crash, he knows a thing or two about crisis management.The problem under Mellor, according to Cox, was that AWG expanded outside the regulated water business Water companies, he says, should be boring “I don’t think it’s boring to run a water company,” he adds. “But in investors’ eyes we want to be boring and predictable.”AWG has been anything but predictable in recent years.

Mellor, who left a year ago, had grandiose plans to turn it into an international water and services group. He bought stakes in companies in far-flung places such as Chile and China for around £200m In 2002 in a policy U-turn, he put them up for sale. After deciding against spinning off the UK water business, he refinanced instead, raising debt to one of the highest levels in the water sector. The refinancing, which was opposed by some shareholders, cost £130m in advisers’ fees.Mellor then capped it all by buying the property and construction business Morrison for £263m The deal turned sour.