CaMS welcomes US-UK Technology Agreement but urges focus on skills, not hardware

The Government has announced a ‘landmark’ UK-US Technology Agreement. The agreement, which will see a series of investments from US-based multinational companies, will bring “new breakthroughs” across AI, data centre construction, skills, computing and life sciences, including through the creation of a second AI Growth Zone in the North-East around Blythe and Cobalt Park.

Reacting to the news, Professor Jens Marklof, Chair of the Campaign for Mathematical Sciences, said:

“This investment is fantastic for the UK, the mathematical sciences and the North East. Mathematics is the fuel on which AI runs, and we will see the employment prospects of our maths graduates go up further following these announcements. However, we have a desperate shortfall of qualified maths teachers, and government needs to step up and invest in next generation maths skills, not just data centres."

Investments announced as part of the Agreement include the following:

AI and computing:

• Microsoft: $30 billion (£22 billion) investment from Microsoft in AI infrastructure and ongoing operations across the UK. It will enable Microsoft to build out the UK’s cloud and AI infrastructure and build the country’s largest supercomputer, with more than 23,000 advanced GPUs, in partnership with Nscale.

• AI Pathfinder: AI Pathfinder has committed to delivering AI compute capacity – essential to developing and deploying AI. This will begin in Northamptonshire, with an initial investment of over £1 billion.

• NVIDIA: announced an intention to invest in the UK’s AI start-up scene and help get technologies and businesses to market. This will be through deploying 120,000 advanced GPUs across the UK, representing “its biggest ever rollout in Europe to date”.

• techUK, Quana and NVIDIA Cooperation: will launch a programme to develop robotics research, and help startups with funding, training, and industry collaboration opportunities to “make the most of AI”.

• Scale AI: will invest £39 million in the UK over the next 2 years, expanding their European HQ in London and quadrupling its employees by the end of next year.

Data Centres:

• Google: Announced the opening of its data centre in Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, as part of a 2-year £5 billion investment in the UK. This includes Google’s capital expenditure, research and development, and related engineering over the next 2 years – and encompasses Google DeepMind with its pioneering AI research in science and healthcare.

• CoreWeave: Investing £1.5 billion in AI data centre capacity and operations in the UK – bringing total investment in the UK to £2.5 billion over the past year. As part of this investment, CoreWeave is partnering with British firm DataVita in Scotland to build one of Europe’s largest, most efficient AI data centres.

• BlackRock: Investing £500 million into enterprise data centres across the country, which includes an initial investment of over £100 million in a data centre expansion west of London.

  
  

Regional Investments:

The Government has separately released details of where investment is being directed:

• Blackstone has already committed £10 billion into its Blyth site.

• Stargate UK is expected be based across several sites in the UK, including in Cobalt Park, which will form part of the newly designated AI Growth Zone in the North East.

• AI experts from local universities including Newcastle University, Durham University, Sunderland University and Northumbria University will further drive research in AI as part of this AI Growth Zone ecosystem. Newcastle’s National Innovation Centre for Data is also developing an AI curriculum to train data scientists and nurture a future talent pipeline.

• US quantum firm IonQ is setting up its EMEA headquarters and a new R&D and manufacturing hub in Oxford, following a $1 billion merger with UK start-up Oxford Ionics.

We will continue to make the case to Government that it is mathematics skills themselves, not just the AI hardware, that is central to the UK’s ambition to be an AI superpower.