Yates believes the recent change in the government's attitude towards casinos will pave the way for "xedodds betting terminals (FOBTs) in Irish betting shops. "I can see no conceivable or logical explanation why there can't be FOBTs in betting shops, " he said.

Yates argues that there is no reason the machines should be banned in the wake of a cabinet decision to scrap proposals by justice minister Michael McDowell to outlaw casinos in Ireland. The cabinet has instead decided to allow such businesses to operate subject to a code of regulations to be drawn up later this year.

Celtic, the 47-store chain owned by former Fine Gael minister Yates and his wife, Deirdre, last week paid a reported 5m to acquire rival bookmaking chain Molloys.

The softening in attitude was one of the factors that convinced Celtic to press ahead with its acquisition of Molloys and formulate a 10m expansion plan that will take the company from 47 shops to 60 over the next three years, according to Yates.

"You have an over 18s, heavilyregulated system of betting shops.

Where better to put a roulette machine?" he said.

FOBTs are coin-operated arcade machines that play popular casino games such as poker and roulette, and pay out a fixed percentage of the money they take in. Hence the term "xed-odds. The machines have proved a huge money-spinner for bookmakers in the UK, pulling in over 20bn in revenue each year.

LONDON CITY AIRPORT, owned by Dermot Desmond, is still on the radar of German airport operator Fraport, according to the company's chief executive.

Wilhelm Bender, who heads up the Frankfurt-based company, said it will decide "in the next two to three weeks" whether to proceed with a bid for the English airport.

Fraport is one of several suitors for the highly-valued site, which could fetch up to 650m according to one analyst's estimate. Desmond bought the airport in 1995 from construction company Mowlem for £23.5m ( 35m) and stands to make a stunning return on his investment if the price anticipated is achieved.

The sale of the airport, which is being handled by Morgan Stanley, has attracted interest from several international airport operators including Fraport and Spanish rival Sacyr Vallehermoso.

While Desmond eyes a hugely pro"table departure from London City Airport another of his investments, a stake in Scottish newspaper The Sportsman, looks a lot less secure. The paper, in which Desmond has invested a reported 1.5m, went into administration last month.

Accountant Peter Kubik of UHY Hacker Young, which is handling the administration, said he expects to make a statement about the company's future this week after a number of "interested parties" expressed interest in investing in the troubled "rm.

TRINITY BIOTECH reported a 107% year-on-year increase in sales of its Unigold rapid HIV test in the "rst half of the year, fuelling a good set of results. Trinity Biotech is in ongoing discussions with the US Food and Drug Administration on what clinical trials need to be conducted before the company is approved to sell the HIV test in the over-the-counter market.

Trinity reported second-quarter revenues up by 20.3% to $27.3m.

Pre-tax pro"ts came in at $2m, before a once-off inventory write-off of $5.8m.

Trinity expects to keep driving overall organic growth of more than 10%. Successful execution on the recently acquired BioMerieux haemostasis division could provide upside to Davy Stockbrokers' current target of $9.50, set on 15 June, the broker said in a note.

INTEL said that a power cut at its advanced Fab24 semiconductor manufacturing facility in Leixlip, Co Kildare, was not the fault of the ESB.

The chip manufacturer said that while gorse "res around Carrickmines did interrupt the supply of electricity to the plant, the company had coincidentally been testing its own generator systems at the time of the outage. It said that manufacturing was not affected and that it was reviewing its procedures to prevent a recurrence.

CONDUIT, which operates the 11850 directory inquiry service, has appointed Denis Creighton as chief executive. Creighton had been COO of the company since 2001.

Creighton had previously been director of operator services at Eircom and head of customer service at Vodafone Ireland.

RANBAXY LABORATORIES, India's largest drug maker, said on Thursday it plans to sell its plant in Cashel, Co Tipperary. The company said it would consolidate its European manufacturing operations in a factory in Romania that it acquired in June for $324m. Ranbaxy said the relocation would help it focus on markets in the states of the former Soviet Union.

The drugs company has been in Ireland since 1961, and acquired the Cashel factory in 1996 from Rima pharmaceuticals. The Cashel plant employed some 83 full time staff, manufacturing generic drugs for export primarily to the UK. Ranbaxy said in a statement that it expects to sell the facility as a going concern and is seeking a buyer.

SPRINT NEXTEL, the American wireless company, revealed plans last week to build a $3bn 4G wireless broadband network in the US. The technology has the promise of delivering speeds up to 70 times faster than some 3G services.

RAYTHEON, the "fth-largest US defence contractor, saw its Derry software centre stormed by protestors on Wednesday. Nine were arrested by the PSNI for breaking windows and trashing computers in the company's offices, which they said were being used to design missile-guidance systems being supplied to Israel. They were led by activist Eamonn McCann.

SDLP leader Mark Durkan said the protestors were putting US foreign direct investment into North Ireland in jeopardy.

"People are rightly free to voice their disgust at the violence in the Middle East and the failure of Britain and America to challenge or contain Israeli actions. People are also free to express opposition to the arms trade, " Durkan said.

"But destroying property and possibly prejudicing other investment and employment prospects is not the way to register such concerns."