Business Diary: Healthy eats from the man from the Pru

Time was when Prudential greeted the world with a snarl, but things have changed since the ascension of Tidjane Thiam to the top job: hacks attending his first results briefing will be sent away with a packed lunch. Just one question – will the Pru, which, after all, offers health cover, come over all politically correct with some "five-a-day" healthy food or will we actually get food someone might want to eat?

Still some distance to travel for Stobart

We bow to no one here in our admiration for Eddie Stobart and its fleet of trucks, but is it really, as it claimed yesterday, the best business brand in the world? "Eddie Stobart tops business superbrand category for 2010", it said. What, above Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Rolls-Royce, say? Well no, in fact. Closer examination of the survey reveals Stobart came in 32nd. Keep on trucking.

Apple ruling hits UK swimwear company

Good news for Simply Beach, the UK swimwear firm, which this week saw its mobile phone app kicked out of Apple's app store. Common sense has now prevailed and Simply Beach, whose App does feature pictures of women in bikinis – but really doesn't carry the "overtly sexual content" about which Apple was concerned – has been quietly reinstated.

Struggling to get by with no pay rise

Don't feel too sorry for Michael Geoghegan, chief executive of HSBC, who is apparently set to give up his right to a pay rise, as part of the banks' latest efforts to calm the public mood. He has recently relocated from London to Hong Kong, which ranks lower on the vast majority of cost of living surveys, so he'll be better off after all.

Robbing the rich to pay for the poor

Another kick in the teeth for the politicians and bankers. The Robin Hood fair tax campaign – fighting for a tax on banking transactions to finance good causes – has signed up 120,000 fans on Facebook since its launch last month. That's four times as many as the main political parties put together.

Number of the day: £16,000

The cost of MontBlanc's Gandhi pen. Indians say this is the wrong way to honour a man known for his austerity.

businessdiary@independent.co.uk