Here are the business stories making the headlines across Scotland and the UK this morning.
Two senior Reform UK officials step down after undercover report
Reform UK says two senior officials have stepped down during a party investigation into claims about funding aired during a Channel 4 News report.
Nigel Farage's senior aide Dan Jukes and Reform's head of policy James Orr have both stood down pending the outcome of the internal probe, the party said.
A Reform UK spokesman said: "The party believes it is important that the investigation is allowed to proceed independently and without prejudice.
"No further comment will be made while the investigation is ongoing."
Read the full BBC story here.
NHS Grampian boss: ‘New eastern super-board will mean there are no excuses for treatment delays’
Thousands more patients are already having tests, surgeries and other planned treatments in the east of Scotland due to a crackdown on “unwarranted variation” between health boards – which could pave the way for First Minister John Swinney’s new-look NHS.
Mr Swinney announced on Tuesday that Scotland’s 14 territorial health boards, including NHS Grampian, would be merged into two mega boards split east/west.
It mirrors “subnational” work which already quietly got under way in NHS Scotland, launched towards the end of last year – and which NHS Grampian chief executive Laura Skaife-Knight has been part of.
Read more in The Press and Journal.
Westhill solar panel firm eyes further growth amid renewables boom
What began as a business founded by a former oil industry worker looking to become his own boss has grown into an Aberdeenshire firm with a seven-figure turnover.
Stuart Munro set up i-Protech in 2015, initially supplying security and fire safety systems.
The business has since moved into renewable energy, with the Westhill firm now employing around 14 people and supplying solar panels, battery storage and more across the North and the North-east.
Read more in The P&J.
Volkswagen board approves plan to cut another 50,000 jobs
The board of German car giant Volkswagen has approved a plan to cut another 50,000 jobs as part of a sweeping turnaround programme. It brings the total number of roles the company plans to shed by 2030 to 100,000.
The group - which includes Audi, Porsche, Skoda as well as the VW brand - said in March that it would cut 50,000 roles by the end of the decade.
The move is a "strong signal" for the future of the firm, which is "taking responsibility for our entire workforce", VW's chief executive Oliver Blume said in a statement on Thursday.
Read more on the BBC website.
Nvidia buys Hugging Face to extend reach over AI ecosystem
Nvidia has acquired the developer platform Hugging Face for $12.9 billion in a deal that will further insert the chipmaker into the software layer underpinning artificial intelligence at a time when many of its largest customers are seeking to reduce their reliance on Nvidia’s hardware.
The deal, the largest outright acquisition in Nvidia’s history, also signals the company’s continuing support for open source models, rather than the proprietary models offered by OpenAI and Anthropic.
Hugging Face is a repository of AI models, enabling users to pick between more than three million options depending on the task. Nvidia said more than 200,000 companies have used the platform to “discover, evaluate, customise and deploy AI”.
Read more in The TImes.
Harvey Nichols suppliers will recover only 15% of money owed
Suppliers of Harvey Nichols are expected to receive less than 15p in the pound after the luxury department store group was acquired by Frasers through a controversial pre-pack administration.
New filings at Companies House reveal the group’s primary trading entity, Harvey Nichols and Company, fell into administration owing £270.5 million to unsecured creditors. Of that, only a maximum of 15 per cent is expected to be returned, according to early-stage estimates from the administrators, FTI Consulting.
Those set to lose out include brand partners such as Victoria Beckham, Jimmy Choo and Canada Goose, which are owed about £353,349, £174,201 and £565,267, respectively. Other unsecured creditors include Jo Malone, Puig and Estée Lauder, while preferential creditors such as HM Revenue & Customs are expected to be repaid in full.
Get the full story in The Times.