The awards are organised by the food and drink experts Zenith Global Ltd and recognise high standards of innovation in a category that’s slowly but surely reinventing itself. 

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https://travolutionevents.co.uk/awards/en/page/home

https://travolutionevents.co.uk/awards/en/page/home

View the video on the company's YouTube channel here.

SKINNY TONIC won awards in TWO categories:

• Best New Brand/Business Award
• Best Sparkling Drink Award

Other winners and nominees at the FoodBev Media Awards included CleanCo, The Naked Collective, Onda, VITHIT Friends Beverage Group, LLC and Mike's Hard Lemonade.

The Irish deal is with MCM Brands known for its premium portfolio of exclusive partners such as Gin Mare, Crystal Head Vodka, and Aviation Gin.

Skinny Tonic, the company behind the first zero-calorie, zero sugar, and 100% natural mixer to launch nationwide in the UK, has revealed two new deals in its July shareholder update.

Notably, the group said it has inked an agreement with MCM Brands for an exclusive distribution deal to Ireland and Northern Ireland.

READ: Skinny Tonic continues to see its sales rocket as it launches new British Raspberry brand

Steven Wilkinson, Skinny Tonic founder/COO said: “We are delighted to be working with MCM Brands who are at the forefront of working with exciting and innovative brands in Ireland. MCM are known for having a premium portfolio of exclusive partners such as GiMare, Crystal Head Vodka, Matusalem Rum, and Skinny Tonic will be proud to sit alongside them. They are a dynamic and experienced team that we look forward to creating a great partnership with.’'

William Doorgan, managing director MCM Brands added: “We are thrilled to have agreed this partnership with Skinny Tonic , We believe Skinny Tonic's potential is huge and they will be a game-changer in the tonic industry.”

Read more on Proactive Investor: https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/925350/skinny-tonic-reveals-two-new-deals-including-an-exclusive-distribution-agreement-for-ireland-and-northern-ireland-925350.html

Rory Chichester writes that "the process was completed in just over a month and in our view, the #FutureFund is a well-executed scheme that is reaching its intended audience – high-growth and innovative UK companies".

We also read today’s announcement from the British Business Bank confirming 465 companies have been approved for £468.7m worth of funding since the scheme was launched back in May which represents more positive momentum for the #FutureFund.

TECS Group is a specialist provider of critical asset maintenance and building compliance solutions across the UK. They are focussed on providing services that are essential to their customers operations and generally covered by strict regulation or legislation. Read more about the company here.

The show will feature our best and most talented creators, and is quite frankly very exciting.

This opportunity was introduced to us through the 360Equity chairman Philip Reid, so it's a great connection.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Global Shakers: Monday 29th June at 5pm (BST)

Global Shakers is a new innovative publishing platform that profiles and tells the story of “game changers” from across industry and society. The people who are innovating, disrupting and changing the world in which we live. The platform creates irresistible content and is building influential networks. Global Shakers is unique in that we validate these “game changers” and bring them together, to be a “Global Shaker” is and will become a badge of honour. The service appeals to business professionals and the innovation-centric from across the world who want to be informed and take inspiration from others. Our mission is to drive positive change and become the go-to destination for people interested in discovering who is literally changing the world.

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Comedy Crowd TV: Thursday 2nd July at 5pm (BST)

Comedy Crowd TV is an exciting new comedy content platform, showcasing the best talent from their huge global community of over 8,000 comedy creators. Traditional studios work with a handful of creators, which means a handful of new ideas and hoping past success will lead to future hits. Comedy Crowd TV work with thousands, crowdsourcing the best content and discovering exciting new talent first.

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Alpha Prospects: Tuesday 7th July at 6pm (BST)

Alpha Prospects ("Alpha") is an award winning investment management company seeking to take strategic investments in companies with fast growth and/or strong recovery prospects. Over the last decade Alpha has invested in several different companies by way of equity positions. Each of these deals has increased the balance sheet of the business and based on the last share placement, the company has an estimated current market capitalisation of over £20 million. Currently the primary focus for Alpha is the energy sector and more particularly new, innovative energy solutions. Alpha now has several holdings in the energy sector, including two in innovative technologies that could solve many of the current emissions issues and thus mitigate the climate crisis. On offer is the opportunity to subscribe for warrants that convert immediately to shares at 2p per share - which is a 64% discount to the current fair value of 5.5p per share.

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Nautical ID International: Thursday 9th July at 6pm (BST)

Nautical ID International (NIDI) is a joint venture between the latter and Nautical ID(NIDS), the Swedish based creator of the Nautical ID Plate. NIDI has the global distribution rights for the Plate whilst its partner NIDS retains the Nordic region rights. The product makes it very easy to contact boat owners who are not on board. Being able to get in contact enables a third party to forewarn the boatowner of an impending or existing problem that can prevent and/or reduce damage and enhance boat management.

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Remember, when investing your capital is at risk

We will be giving away a massive £150 Share Prize giveaway to one lucky listener on the night.

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We will be giving away a massive £150 Share Prize giveaway to one lucky listener on the night.

Register for Webinar

We are working with the BBC Studios Digital Comedy Producer Jon Davenport on building partnerships with major UK production companies and channels looking for a pipeline of untapped talent.

We are also working with a US TV personality on bringing British Comedy to a US audience through a Comedy Crowd show. The revenue forecasts in our pitch deck and financials have been updated to reflect this.

We will be giving away a massive £150 Share Prize giveaway to one lucky listener on the night.

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Prize Giveaway: For one lucky listener on the night we are giving away a MASSIVE £150 worth of shares in a range of our portfolio companies. The winner will be picked randomly from the attendee list. To enter you need to be present on the webinar as well as registered as an Investor on 360Equity.

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Read the full article here: The Woman Behind NHS Homes.

Merilee commented on her linkedin:

"Inspiring to be working with such amazing companies and homeowners to help so many NHS workers during the crisis. We have delivered over £1.7m in stays to workers across the UK and counting!!!"

UnderTheDoormat raised funds on 360Equity at the beginning of the year.

As you are aware, our sole objective at present is to recover various cargoes of metals owned by our Pacific salvage client, transport them to our chosen refinery after which they will be sold and utilised to fund the start of the Pacific salvage programme as and when allowed. One such cargo has had a number of false starts but in the country of current location, relevant Government agencies apparently opened for business yesterday and we would hope to have the paperwork (for which we have paid) processed quickly. We have transport available as a new investor in the Pacific project has supplied a suitable aircraft. We await clearance.

As to other cargoes, and the start of the Pacific salvage, subject to having successfully sold the cargo above, the country of relevance opens up on June 16th. We would hope to bring you further news on or around that date.

We are immensely frustrated at present and clearly way behind our originally planned time table. That said, we continue to explore every opportunity to move forward and will report to you when we have clear and positive news.

Yours Faithfully,

Philip Reid | Non-Executive Director

Global Shaker Profile: https://globalshakers.com/world-shakers/jon-jayson/

List: https://globalshakers.com/shaker-list/20-super-creative-innovative-founders-we-love/

Last week we released episode 1 of The Big Lockdown Laugh - a show celebrating the best of lockdown comedy and including creators with millions of social media views.

We ran a competition for people to nominate the best lockdown comedy video they have seen, and received over 400 entries in 1 week.

Check out the first episode here:

The contract will see TECS provide Water Risk Assessment and Remedial Works to a wide range of residential properties across Great London and the South East of England, including the Isle of Wight. The contract will be delivered through our Gas & Water division with mobilisation having already commenced.

Andy MacDonald, TECS Group’s Operations Director, said: “We already work for a number of the UK’s most prominent Housing Associations and this is an extremely import sector for our business. We are looking forward to the opportunity of building on our track-record in the sector and successfully delivering these vital compliance services for Southern Housing Group.”

You will be aware that the planned salvage in the Pacific followed the companybeing retained by an international metals group. The funding of the entire salvage programme was to be financed by the liquidation and sale of gold land discoveries owned in part by our client.

Unfortunately these were held in an area almost immediately closed down following the onset of the virus and where, ever since, it has been incredibly difficult to travel to or from to progress our operations.

Not surprisingly, our client held deposits elsewhere and the liquidation of two identified and assayed deposits would have enabled BGL to commence operations once cleared to do so. Our repeated failure to transport these latter deposits to an approved LME refinery have become extremely frustrating (and costly) and have been a function of beaurocracy, international flight requirements and changing attitudes in both despatch and recipient countries to outgoing and incoming flights. That said, the deposits are identified and assayed, local taxes have been paid and we continue to explore all means of transporting the cargoes for refining and sale as a matter of urgency.

The only good news is that the price of gold continues to rise whereas the price of oil has fallen dramatically. The latter is expected to result in a considerable reduction in salvage vessel charter costs from which, as when we commence, we would hope to benefit.

I will hope to bring you better news in the very near future but thankyou for your patience and would remind all that our ambitions are as before; to conclude the Pacific salvage and return to the Atlantic target as soon as we can.

Yours Faithfully,

Philip Reid | Non-Executive Director

We are extremely pleased to be awarded an extension to our current contract that will see us continue to provide these critical services, directly delivered by our LCA accredited engineers.

Commenting on the contract extension, Andrew MacDonald, Operations Director said: 'We have a long standing relationship with Cobalt Housing and look forward to successfully delivering these important services in a region where we have worked for many years.'

SimplyPayMe reflects the brand best and reinforces exactly what they do. You will notice the new logo and rebranding on all of SmartTrade App platforms.

Its important to note that the legal registered name for the company is still SmartTrade App Limited. It is only the brand name that has altered.

Skinny Mediterranean, Skinny Indian and Skinny Aromatic are the most popular tonic products based on sales, according to the online retailer.

“We believe this is unprecedented for a brand to take all three of the top positions at one time,” said Steve Wilkinson, a founding director of Skinny Tonic.

“Skinny Ginger is also doing extremely well in its own category, currently the third best selling ginger ale.”

Wilkinson added the cucumber tonic would have been in the top 10 but it went sold out two weeks ago, and should be back available shortly.

One of the recent companies they have onboarded is a lending company that will be using SmartTrade for their 900 UK-wide representatives, transacting £150 million per year. Staff training will take place on Wednesday 11th, March, after which initial transactions are expected to commence within the following weeks.

SmartTrade is currently in the process of onboarding a handful of various other companies that transact between £1-20 million in card volumes per year, in which we expect to have them onboarded within the next 2 months. Though this will translate into direct revenue for SmartTrade App with various margins depending on each company's volume, this will also serve as a direct proof of SmartTrade's capacity and ability to process vast volumes of payments to the large banks and institutions around the world which will in turn instill confidence in the company's ability to scale quickly and easily.

These five companies, Airbnb, Booking Holdings, the Expedia Group, TripAdvisor and the Chinese platform Tujia, registered 73% of all reservations, showing how the booking landscape has become highly consolidated.

In many other aspects, however, especially when talking about holiday homes, the short-term rental sector looks extremely fragmented. In fact, there are millions of independent hosts, property managers and business-to-business vendors trying to build a strong presence in this market. It’s not just start ups driving the growth of branded home rentals, also bigger and well-known companies like the Marriott International hotel chain, which introduced its own Homes & Villas brand in April 2019, are jostling for position to benefit from this added spotlight.

2020 promises to see clear winners emerging from this fragmented category, leading the travel industry to come up with a new categorization, looking to distinguish between professional rentals and host-run rentals. In this complex landscape, UnderTheDoormat has been recognized by Skift as one of the Top Branded Property Managers company shaping this market in 2019. We are planning for significant growth across London and plan to expand into new markets both through our full-service model and through partnerships with high quality local operators. Our commitment to exceptional service has been recognised in a number of ways: as well as winning several recent awards, we were the first company in our sector to receive official Short-Term Accommodation Association (STAA) accreditation, the first of its kind globally.

Read the full Skift report here.

Listen to the recording of the webinar here.

The available flavours are:

• Clear Coffee
• Aromatic
• Mediterranean
• Ginger Ale
• Indian
• Cucumber

These flavours remain all zero calorie, zero sugar with nothing artificial.

They are available at £0.99 each.

The products are featured in the "Other Products We Recommend" section on the website of The Skinny Food Co.

https://theskinnyfoodco.com/collections/the-skinny-food-co-full-shop

The Global Pet Expo, presented by the American Pet Products Association (APPA) and Pet Industry Distributors Association (PIDA), is the pet industry's largest annual trade show featuring the newest, most innovative pet products on the market today.

The 2019 Show featured 1,174 exhibitors, 3,604 booths and more than 3,000 new product launches. 7,029 of the most qualified pet product buyers in the industry attended the Show, including an impressive number of international retailers.

In 2020, Global Pet Expo will take place FEBRUARY 26-28 in Orlando, Florida. Global Pet Expo is open to independent retailers, distributors, mass-market buyers, and other qualified professionals.

The Rockster team have a full expedition stand this year and will be showcasing their life-enhancing superfood products for dogs.

Commenting on the contract win, Darren Hilliar, Business Development Director said: “We are delighted to be working with Euro Car Parks and to further our track record within the growing UK car parking sector.”

The major causes of delay have been unforeseen weather and public health issues. The volcanic eruption expectations of further activity led to a shut down of necessary transit points to the salvage area. This has been compounded by the outbreak of the coronavirus. As the salvage programme is largely serviced by systems and vessels supplied out of either Hong Kong or Singapore and with virus related deaths having already been reported near the salvage area, we have been badly hit. We are unsure as to how matters will develop but are in contact with all relevant authorities on a regular basis.

With regards to the salvage programme, all salvage equipment and specifications have been agreed and quotations received. The latter, plus a final decision as to choice of vessel, will be implemented as soon as we have a green light to commence operations.

We shall publish further news when appropriate to do so.

Yours faithfully,

Philip Reid | Executive Chairman

Kent Vorland contributed to the show by pitching SmartTrade App in front of an audience of fintech professionals and investors.

More information on the event can be found here: https://fintechweektelaviv.com/2020

Metropolitan Thames Valley was formed through the partnership of Thames Valley Housing Association and Metropolitan Housing Trust in October 2018. Metropolitan Thames Valley is a member of the National Housing Federation and the g15, which represents London’s largest housing associations and houses one in 10 Londoners.

The contract will see TECS provide a full range of Water Treatment and Legionella Control services across 228 properties within MTV's Assisted Living portfolio in the Greater London region.

'Enhance your dog's diet' was the title of their article about Rockster.

Animal Wellness is no stranger to the Rockster suite of products, and have mentioned them before in their publications with world-wide readership.

You can read the full article text here.

The ISO 9001 standard is an international recognition given to organisations who continue to uphold an efficient and effective quality management system. The ISO 14001 standard specifies the requirements for an environmental management system that an organisation can use to enhance its environmental performance.

Achieving the ISO 9001 & 14001 accreditation demonstrates our commitment to delivering a consistent and high-quality service to all our customers, with a focus on environmental management and sustainability.

Merilee Karr founder of the London-based luxury home rental platform UnderTheDoormat often gets asked what makes her startup different from the market-dominating Airbnb.

“Most people think Airbnb is a company that provides homestays,” says Merilee who originally hails from Ohio, US but has been living in South West London for the past 18 years.

“In actual fact, it is just a booking engine, like Expedia or Booking.com. They are all, Online Travel Agencies or OTA’s and simply channels to market for a company like UnderTheDoormat, just like they are for hotels.” 

Founded in 2014, UnderTheDoormat offers a full-service solution for owners of beautiful, sometimes vacant homes wanting to make an effortless income while knowing that everything is in safe hands. 

Airbnb is just one of the company’s many routes to market alongside; Expedia, Booking.com, HomeAway, Bridgestreet, TripAdvisor, and now Marriott, and about 30+ other smaller platforms and channels.

With their hotelier’s approach to short-term homestays, UnderTheDoormat is solving the problem of Airbnb anxiety by taking away the risk and fear from homeowners and guests.

We have all heard a homestay disaster story,  and these can make people shy away from renting out their homes and guests dubious as to what they might find.

“As a homeowner, I find it astonishing that people would post up their home and rent it out without having someone meet the guests and do all the I.D. verification, but also to have a proper insurance policy in place,” says Merilee. 

“For me, this is really worrying because your home is your most important asset.” 

UnderTheDoormat boasts homes with grand pianos and artwork from famous artists. “They can trust us because we have the insurance in place.”

Read the full interview on Global Shakers

Over 10 members of the TECS took part in a Zorb 5-aside football match and we’ve attached photographic evidence!

Well done and we look forward to beating this target in 2020.

Explore the suite of products at www.firescape.uk

For 360Equity Members use the discount code for 20% off all products: club360

To summarise, the BGL salvage team has been working on the final designs for the proposed salvage equipment set for imminent fabrication and construction which will be used for its North Atlantic operations during the 2020 season. BGL has split its designs into four differing categories, these being 1) the subsea control module, 2) salvage tooling attachments such as grabs and shears which will interface and be powered by the control module, 3) a mass flow excavation system and 4) ancillary equipment.

As the control module is a unique design item, the manufacturers are few and far between. BGL has a long-term relationship with the ideal manufacturer for this component which is currently reviewing the design principal. The latter’s expertise and advice are being added to the concept in order to reach a final draft design. Once agreed, the control module design will be issued for construction.

BGL is now in discussions with a European based manufacturer of grabs whose quality equipment it has successfully used in the past. Using the BGL design team, the former is now working out the finite details to ensurethe equipment can operate unhindered at the ultra-deep water depths BGL has specified. Needing the salvage system to be ‘universal’ in its concept and design viz the single control module has the ability to interface with all differing items of salvage tooling, BGL is designing the grabs, shears and mass flow excavation system to all have the same connection to the control module; this will allow for simple tooling change outs to be performed efficiently and safely. This interface design will result from both manufacturers working together with BGL providing its practical knowledge base to assist.

BGL has completed the design of the Mass Flow Excavation (MFE) system and is currently correlating the components from various suppliers across Europe; the system is going to be built by a constructor known well to BGL and based in France. Again, using a unique design concept, BGL is able to have this constructed and ready for operations at a fraction of the cost of an ‘off the shelf’ rental alternative. 

The final items required to bring all the components to a systematic state include workshop containers, rigging loft, cargo processing wet laboratory and ultra-deep water cargo recovery baskets. These, when combined with a surface supply hydraulic power system for the salvage tooling (used in very shallow water situations) and when the subsea control module is undergoing maintenance and repair, will allow for uninterrupted salvage operations. BGL is yet to complete the full designs of these latter items. However, as they are the easiest and quickest to source and/or fabricate with the shortest lead times, they will all become available through the Norwegian based vendor to coincide with the control module and tooling.

As to the forthcoming Pacific salvage programme, the BGL team is about to depart for survey and salvage planning, including the charter of the chosen salvage vessel. As previously explained, the salvage will be preceded by a comprehensive survey of the targets which is expected to be completedbefore the end of the year. As before, the salvage programme is still planned to commence in early 2020 subject to vessel availability

Yours Faithfully,

Philip Reid | Non-Executive Director

SmartTrade App won in two categories last night at the 2019 Payment Awards:

• Most Disruptive Payments Technology
• Payments Pioneer Award (awarded to Gary Prince - Chairman)

2019 Shortlist: https://www.payments-awards.com/awards/shortlist19.php

"It's very exciting, not only from an accomplishment point of view, but for a company who's looking to take over the world by providing their technology to others, we couldn't have won better and more relevant awards than Most Disruptive Payments Tech and Gary's individual Payments Pioneer award. If that's not a testament to a company you should be licensing technology from, then I don't know what is! 2020 will be a killer year for SmartTrade!" - Kent Vorland | CEO SmartTrade App

This is a FREE partnership to:

• Raise awareness of the Firescape products to key decision makers within our business, supply chain and our customers
• Promote the products in suitable Wates bids and tenders.
• Pitch Firescape innovation in person to Wates Customers.
• Develop relationships with leading companies, increasing Firescape credibility and attracting additional customers
• Opportunity to trial innovation on Wates project, creating a live-test dataset and case study that validates your solution.

The Wates Group is one of the leading privately-owned construction, development and property services companies in the UK. Together, we will inspire better ways of creating the places, communities and businesses of tomorrow.

The judges commented: “As with all our awards here at SME News, the Energy and Power Awards victors are carefully chosen when we go through our extensive research and judging phase. We investigate many different fields when judging a company such as dedication to the industry, their excellence in their given sector and any innovations they bring to the industry.”