Special Reports

If ever research and innovation were going to boost Western Australia’s economic prospects, now is the time.

Woodside chief executive Don Voelte has warned Australians not to take the resources boom for granted or assume the resources sector would easily cope with all of the challenges facing it.

The dumping of Telstra’s plans to build a $4 billion high-speed broadband network through Australia has raised questions about the future of broadband technology.

The ongoing debate over broadband access has prompted calls for an overhaul to the current copper cable network.

The booming resources sector has underpinned strong returns by listed Western Australian companies in WA Business News’ fifth annual survey of total shareholder returns.

Resource stocks are not the only ones to be profiting from the burgeoning environment in Western Australia, with companies in the mining services and property sectors also welcoming significant returns.

Uranium company Paladin Resources was the top performing Western Australian stock for the three years to June by a wide margin, with an average annual total shareholder return of 618 per cent.

A diverse range of resource stocks, including coal, gold, iron ore and uranium, as well as non-resource stocks from the property and water treatment sectors, featured among Western Australia’s top stocks in one-year returns.

Investors in listed Western Australian companies are usually focused on the potential for capital gains, but in a minority of cases there is potential to earn a tidy income from dividends.

Winemaker Evans & Tate, internet services provider iiNet, pharmaceutical manufacturer Chemeq and ticketing technology company ERG are some of the high-profile Western Australian companies that are laggards in the latest total shareholder return survey.

While significant one-year returns are a positive sign for any business, maintaining these results year-in-year-out is a challenge of more significant proportions.

Sydney-based Australian Property Monitors believes Perth is in line for a price correction of between 16 and 20 per cent in six to 12 months, if global commodities markets slow.

In the midst of Western Australia’s escalating property prices, Jenelle Carter spoke to a number of prominent WA property figures to find out if and when the bubble will burst.

Developers are lining up for a piece of the next phase of Perth’s office market action to capitalise on the solid returns promised by high rents and current vacancy rates of 3.5 per cent.

A hot property market and soaring median house prices are not the exclusive domain of Perth, with regional centres also getting a good dose of property fever.

The departure of Michael Chaney last year has done little to halt the Wesfarmers juggernaut, with the industry giant named as the top Western Australian corporate brand in this year’s WA Business News survey, ahead of Woodside and Alinta.

It is one thing to develop an emerging brand in a booming economy but another altogether to maintain the brand into the long term.

Western Australia’s dominant health insurance player HBF has shot up the ranks from fifth position last year to capture the prized number one spot in the WA Business News list of our state’s most recognised brands.

Competition among advertising agencies in the design market and the failure of local resource companies to invest in design services were two of the many hurdles facing the sector in Western Australia, according to John Emery, principal creative director

Brands with distant owners have come under the spotlight as poor performers in WA Business News’ fifth annual branding survey, with BankWest highlighted for its lack of local focus.

A rugby club and a brewery may have some obvious synergies from a social viewpoint, but what do they both have in common with an energy utility?

Expressing a clear brand personality and a top-down acceptance of the importance of branding are key issues that need to be addressed, according to many of those who responded to the WA Business News survey.

With a boom-fuelled surplus, Perth architects want the state government to take the bull by the horns and provide some vision for the city.

Independent urban think-tank, City Vision, may have reached its 20th year in Perth, but the group has not lost any of its zeal.

Geoff Warn believes change is inevitable, it is just a matter of when.

In the 18 months since his appointment as the state’s government architect, Professor Geoffrey London has played a major role in the commissioning of a number of public building projects – some of them attracting considerable controversy among Perth’s arc

The proposed Treasury Building development is not the only civic building courting controversy in Perth, following the announcement by Culture and the Arts Minister Sheila McHale of a $42 million performing arts venue to be built on the corner of Roe and

The Court and Gallop governments offered nearly $10 million in financial assistance to four call centre operators in Western Australia with a success rate of just 50 per cent.

Australia’s largest towel manufacturer, Canning Vale Weaving Mills, plans to close its manufacturing operations in Perth and lay-off 140 staff, despite having received $20 million in state and federal government assistance over the past eight years.

Western Australia’s buoyant economy has improved local companies’ strike rate in accessing support through AusIndustry’s competitive grants programs.

When communications company Motorola selected Perth as the site for a major software engineering centre, it was hailed as a breakthrough that would support the development of new industry in Western Australia.

A small number of big companies, including Motorola, Westpac and defence contractor Raytheon, have received multi-million dollar incentives from the state government to establish or expand their Western Australian operations.