Business
Citroen owners left stranded over airbag safety risk
BBC News
An estimated 120,000 motorists in the UK have been left unable to drive their cars after a safety alert over a potentially lethal fault with airbags.
Lisa Shackleton is one of them. The 69-year-old owns a 2014 Citroen DS3 and she needs it to take her elderly husband to specialist medical appointments.
She’s also worried about how she can get to a cottage she booked for a summer holiday, which is a three-hour drive away, to be close to her daughter, who is undergoing chemotherapy.
Car giant Stellantis, which owns Citreon, has said people should stop using versions of the popular Citroen C3 and the related DS3 altogether until they are fixed.
But Lisa is one of a number of owners who have told the BBC they face long waits to get the fix done. Stellantis said it was “inevitable” that customers would be inconvenienced.
The “stop-drive” instruction issued by Stellantis followed growing concerns about the safety of airbags fitted to these models, following a fatal accident in France last month.
Lisa contacted the BBC via Your Voice, Your BBC News.
“I’ve tried to get the car fixed, but as I didn’t get to know about the recall soon enough, the earliest it can be done is the end of July,” she says.
“It’s booked in at a dealership in York, and that’s an hour’s drive away.”
Another motorist told the BBC she had not been able to book her car in for the repair until January next year.
Stellantis said it was “working to maximise” the number of vehicles it could repair each day, and that priority needed to be given to those with the most urgent needs.
Airbag scandal
Stop-drive recalls, where owners are told not to use their cars at all due to safety risks, are rare. This one affects all C3 and DS3 models built from 2009-2016, as well as a handful of DS3s produced from 2016-2019. Stellantis said they should not be driven until airbags produced by the now defunct Japanese supplier Takata have been replaced.
It is the latest development in a long-running saga which has led to the recall of an estimated 100 million cars worldwide over the past decade.
The issue was brought back into focus last month by the death of a motorist in northern France. A 37-year-old woman driving a Citroen C3 was killed after a minor collision in Reims when she was struck by flying metal from a faulty airbag.
Takata was once one of the world’s biggest suppliers of airbags, safety devices which are meant to protect people from impacts when accidents occur. But in 2013 reports began to emerge of people being killed or injured by their products.
Explosive chemicals, used to inflate the bags quickly in the event of an accident, were becoming more volatile over time, especially in warm and humid conditions.
This could cause them to explode with too much force, fracturing their metal container, and sending shrapnel into the cabin of the vehicle.
A large number of car makers were affected and rapidly responded with a swathe of recalls. However Stellantis, then known as PSA Group prior to a merger with FiatChrysler, said it had been told by Takata that airbags made in its European factories were not affected, and they continued to be fitted in new vehicles as a result.
Takata filed for bankruptcy in 2017, its reputation destroyed by the affair.
‘Poor communication’
Stellantis said it had only become aware of incidents involving European-made airbags in 2019, and initially believed only cars in hot and humid regions were affected. It began a recall campaign in those areas.
In April last year the recall was extended across the whole of Europe, but people were still allowed to drive their vehicles while they awaited a repair.
The C3 and DS3 were already covered by this recall, but following the incident in northern France, Stellantis went further, announcing a stop-drive action across the continent, including in the UK. This took effect on 20 June.
Since then, however, dozens of car owners have complained to the BBC of poor communication from Stellantis and mixed, sometimes contradictory, messages from Citroen and DS dealerships.
Despite the sometimes serious disruption caused to car owners’ daily lives, Stellantis said it had no plans to provide compensation while adding that it had “mobilised the whole company” to source the number of replacement airbags required.
A spokesperson said: “It is inevitable, with such a large number of vehicles affected, that customers will be inconvenienced in the short term.”
What is not clear is how customers should get their cars to dealerships for the repair work, as they cannot be driven. Industry experts say drivers should check with their insurers before getting behind the wheel.
The company said it was “investigating options of airbag replacement at other sites, in addition to our Citroen network, including at [the owner’s] home”.
Meanwhile in France, the government has told drivers in Corsica and in the country’s overseas territories, where the climate is hotter, to stop using any cars of any brand fitted with Takata airbags.
The same instruction applies to vehicles on the French mainland built before 2011. In total, around 2.5 million cars are affected.
In the UK, the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency said it supported Stellantis’ decision to issue a stop-drive recall and was working with the company to raise awareness of the issue, but did not currently have any plans to order a wider recall.
Owners can find out whether their car is included in the recall here.
Business
Capgemini to buy WNS to boost its business process services with AI – Computerworld
For Gartner vice president analyst DD Mishra, WNS’s investments in intelligent automation, analytics, and agentic solutions including its TRAC analytics suite and Malkom knowledge management platform will complement Capgemini’s existing technology and consulting strengths.
Sharath Srinivasamurthy, research vice president at IDC, pointed to the acquisitions WNS has itself made in recent months, including Kipi.ai, Smart Cube, and OptiBuy to enhance its data, analytics, and procurement stack and extend its proficiency in business process operations, said.
However, Rajesh Ranjan, managing partner at Everest Group, views the WNS acquisition as more of a strategic play rather than being focused on garnering more agentic tools or capabilities.
Business
Locafy Launches AI-Powered SEO Suite Targeting 40M Business Market

Locafy’s AI Search Platform Powers Visibility Across Organic and AI Search
New Product Lineup Tailored to Local, National, and e-Commerce Businesses
AI-Powered Tools Designed to Automate Engagement and Accelerate Online Presence
PERTH, Australia, July 07, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Locafy Limited (NASDAQ: LCFY, “Locafy”), a globally recognized leader in location-based digital marketing, today unveiled its FY26 suite of AI-powered SEO products. These solutions, now commercially available following successful market testing, are designed to deliver measurable improvements across organic, AI, and marketplace search results.
Locafy initially outlined its AI-powered publishing roadmap in December 2024, promising to streamline content production and improve cost-effective online visibility for businesses.
“We are excited to announce that we’ve delivered on that promise,” said Gavin Burnett, CEO of Locafy.
All of Locafy’s publishing and SEO products are designed to drive visibility in search engines and, increasingly, AI-driven search tools and marketplaces. Recent research shows these optimizations extend across both traditional and emerging search platforms.
“We’ve evolved our technology to influence not only search engine rankings but also AI search results,” said Burnett. “Our platform helps position our clients’ websites as authoritative sources for high-value keywords, across local, national, and e-commerce campaigns.”
Burnett added, “We’ve also automated the creation of AI-search-ready landing pages, opening up a greenfield opportunity for scaled monetization. Our U.S. directory includes more than 9.68 million direct business listings, and our citation management partners publish more than 28 million business listings across our directories. Each of these represents either a direct sales opportunity or a chance to collaborate with partners using the data we already publish on their behalf.”
Locafy is focused on three primary solution categories:
- Online Business Listings
- Local SEO
- AI-powered engagement tools
Online Business Listings
Locafy continues to assert that online business listings form the cornerstone of successful Local SEO. These listings supply structured data that fuels automated SEO product generation. Locafy currently publishes more than 9.5 million listings in the U.S. and remains focused on partnerships with citation management firms and multi-location businesses. It is also exploring acquisitions of databases, directories, and citation management assets.
The Total Addressable Market (TAM) for the Local SEO solution in their key target markets of USA, Canada, Australia, and the UK is more than 40 million businesses.
“We currently host more than 63 million business listings worldwide, of which more than 40 million are in the U.S., Canada, Australia and the UK,” said Burnett. “However, our direct sales opportunity is more than 11.4 million, plus we have more than 28 million listings that we publish on behalf of partners, who can now connect to our Platform to automate the production of our Local SEO products for their clients.”
Country | Partner Added* | Claimed* |
Australia | 2,145,707 | 652,351 |
Canada | 1,533,479 | 289,274 |
United Kingdom | 3,458,205 | 802,003 |
United States of America | 33,076,154 | 9,684,329 |
TOTAL | 40,213,545 | 11,427,957 |
Local SEO
The flagship solution, Localizer, integrates listing syndication, AI-search optimization, review management, and Google Map Pack enhancement.
“We haven’t seen another product that combines these capabilities—at a price point starting around
AI-powered Engagement Tools
In addition to improving search visibility, Locafy has developed a scalable, cost-effective AI Voice Concierge that can serve as a virtual receptionist, product expert, or customer service agent.
“This is our first step into AI-enabled customer engagement,” said Burnett. “Our Voice Concierge acts like a digital team member—it can take bookings, provide answers, and interact 24/7. Just feed it your business documents and it learns. We record and transcribe every interaction, giving clients full transparency.
“This kind of capability once felt like science fiction, but it’s here now—and Locafy is helping businesses adapt and thrive in an AI-powered world.”
Over the past six months, Locafy has streamlined its product suite, automated key production processes, and validated product performance through live testing. With this foundation in place, the Company is poised for commercial growth in FY2026.
While the company still offers solutions for National SEO and e-Commerce, it believes the immediate opportunity afforded by its breakthroughs in AI Search represents a larger and more scalable revenue opportunity with far greater automation already in place.
About Locafy
Locafy (Nasdaq: LCFY, LCFYW) is a globally recognized software-as-a-service (SaaS) technology company specializing in local search engine marketing. Founded in 2009, Locafy’s mission is to revolutionize the US
Investor Relations Contact:
Matt Glover
Gateway Group, Inc.
(949) 574-3860
LCFY@gateway-grp.com
Business
Apple appeals against ‘unprecedented’ €500m EU fine over app store | Apple
Apple has launched an appeal against an “unprecedented” €500m (£430m) fine imposed by the EU on the company, in the latest clash between US tech companies and Brussels.
The iPhone maker accused the European Commission – the EU’s executive arm – of going “far beyond what the law requires” in a dispute over its app store.
In April, the commission fined Apple €500m after finding the company had breached the Digital Markets Act by preventing app developers from steering users to cheaper deals outside the app store.
Last month, Apple overhauled its app store rules to comply with the EU order to scrap its technical and commercial curbs on developers in order to avoid fines of 5% of its average daily worldwide revenue, or about €50m a day.
As a result Apple introduced new fee structures for developers using its app store. On Monday, Apple accused Brussels of making it deploy “confusing” business terms in order to avoid the threat of fines.
“Today we filed our appeal because we believe the European Commission’s decision – and their unprecedented fine – go far beyond what the law requires,” said Apple, announcing an appeal to the general court, the second highest court in the EU. “As our appeal will show, the EC is mandating how we run our store and forcing business terms which are confusing for developers and bad for users.”
Apple also accused the commission of unlawfully expanding the definition of “steering” – or the language and methods the company allows developers to use when guiding consumers outside its app stores.
The company said officials on Brussels had changed the definition by, for instance, not just focusing on whether app developers should be allowed to link to an external website, but also on whether developers should be permitted to promote offers inside an app.
Donald Trump’s senior trade adviser, Peter Navarro, has accused the EU of using “lawfare” against big US tech companies, describing the use of regulations against American companies such as Apple and Meta as part of a barrage of “non-tariff weapons” used for by foreign states against the US.
Henna Virkkunen, the European Commission vice-president responsible for tech sovereignty, said in April that the EU will not rip up its tech rules in an attempt to agree a trade deal with the US. In January, Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of the Facebook owner Meta, accused the EU of “institutionalising censorship” via its digital rules.
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Trump has set a 9 July deadline to seal a trade deal with the bloc – with the threat of imposing a 50% tariff on EU imports into the US if agreement is not reached.
Tom Smith, a competition lawyer at Geradin Partners and a former legal director at the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority, said Apple “fundamentally hates” attempts to change its app store.
“The blunt truth is that it is worth spending a few million on legal fees in order to disrupt and delay the development of a more open app ecosystem, which is a market that is worth many billions a year to Apple,” he said.
The European Commission has been approached for comment.
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