The new figures mean the economy is showing signs of being less dependent on consumer spending

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The new figures mean the economy is showing signs of being less dependent on consumer spending.The revision took the annual growth rate to 4.2 per cent, almost double the initial estimate of 2.2 per cent.Analysts said this upward revision could be enough to push the final version of second quarter GDP growth up to 0.6 from 0.5 per cent."It will be a close call, reflecting the fact that the previous estimate had been rounded up," Simon Rubinsohn, the chief global economist at Gerrard stockbrokers, said."Stronger capital expenditure will be welcomed by the Chancellor, who is already preparing the ground for a downward revision to the ambitious GDP growth forecast," Mr Rubinsohn said.Policymakers have flagged business investment as looking unusually weak, since many companies are flush with cash and the FTSE 100 index is at a four-year high."The Bank argued, in the August Inflation Report, that the profile of business investment growth had been weaker than anticipated in May, and that there were good reasons to think that the climate for investment was better than the numbers indicated," George Buckley, the UK economist at Deutsche Bank, said.The ONS, which has been criticised over the scale of some its recent revisions, said this was due to late data.There has been significant investment in new buildings by the financial services industry, while spending was also higher in private-sector manufacturing and transport.. DreamWorks has already pared off much of its original business. It abandoned plans to build a hi-tech studio lot in Los Angeles in 1999. Its music arm was sold in 2003 to Universal Music, a separate company from the film studio.Last year it spun off DreamWorks Animation in a stock market flotation.

The maker of Shrek and Madagascar has since had a torrid time, issuing a profits warning in July due to weak DVD sales and disclosing it was the subject of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation over share sales.Talks with Universal only concerned the live action studio and its library of 60 films, including Saving Private Ryan, American Beauty and Gladiator.Reports said Universal, whose parent company is General Electric, believed $1bn was too high a price. One of the concerns is the role of Mr Spielberg, who has complete creative freedom. Universal is also thought to be worried about how long Mr Spielberg, who is 58, will continue to make movies at his current rate. "We pursued it for quite some time, we were unable to come to terms and we're no longer in discussions with them," Mr Geffen told The Wall Street Journal However, some on Wall Street believe talks could resume. The breakdown in negotiations comes after two months of exclusive talks between DreamWorks and Universal, the largest film producer in the US. DreamWorks was founded 11 years ago by Mr Spielberg, and two other Hollywood heavyweights: the animation expert, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and the music mogul, David Geffen.A deal with Universal would have marked the end of an experiment by the three to operate a small creative business, including films, animation and music, at a time when Hollywood is dominated by large conglomerates.

A planned $1bn (£560m) merger between two major Hollywood studios - DreamWorks SKG and NBC Universal - has been called off amid disagreements over price and speculation that DreamWorks' co-founder Steven Spielberg would not be given enough freedom under the terms of the deal. "That is more than twice all the oil recovered up to now in all of human history," Mr Tillerson said.Craig Pennington, an energy analyst at Schroders in London, said: "The message from these two [Naimi and Tillerson] is that, 'Don't worry We do have enough oil Just give us time to bring it in'.". On a more conservative basis, the world still had more than 3 trillion barrels from conventional fields, oil sands deposits and other sources. Mr Tillerson said that by some estimates there was as much as 7 trillion barrels of oil yet to be discovered. By extension, these critics suggest the world has reached, or is about to reach, the high point of production.Separately, Exxon's Mr Tillerson told the convention in South Africa that his company estimated that global energy demand would increase by 50 per cent over the next 25 years. Most projections of how that demand will be met assume that Saudi Arabia will be able to ramp up production to 15 million barrels a day or more by 2020.However, sceptics, led by the US banker Matthew Simmons, have argued that production in Saudi Arabia's known oil fields is already declining and that no major new fields have been discovered.