Rachel Reeves hails £750m Edinburgh supercomputer as cornerstone of UK’s AI future
Chancellor outlines AI regulation roadmap alongside £750m Edinburgh supercomputer plan
The UK will invest £750 million into a national artificial intelligence (AI) supercomputer in Edinburgh as part of a £1.1 billion plan to boost British work to develop, deploy and scale AI technologies.
This includes £400 million to buy next generation AI chips, £150 million of which is committed to go to British firms.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves also said the tender process for the Edinburgh supercomputer would soon begin as she spoke about the £1.1 billion AI Hardware Plan.
She also said she was launching an AI advisory roadmap to provide practical guidance on how existing rules apply to emerging AI ahead of legislation to regulate the sector due in the autumn, which she announced in her Mais Lecture in March.
“I announced that we would legislate to give powers to safely test innovative products and services in ways current regulation prohibits.
“The Secretary of State for Business will bring forward that legislation in the autumn and, in advance of that, today, I am launching the Advisory AI Growth Lab, bringing together regulators to provide practical guidance on how existing rules apply to emerging AI applications, with our first focus in legal services,” she told the AI adoption summit in London.
She said she would also publish a financial services AI adoption plan in her Mansion House speech on July 14.
“Three months ago, I set out a strategy. Today, I have shown how we are delivering it: removing barriers to adoption; backing strong, great British firms; building the right infrastructure; and actively managing the transition.
“The countries that succeed in AI will be those that act.
“Britain has the talent, we have the research and the entrepreneurship to drive forward from invention to adoption.”
It was announced last year that the £750 million infrastructure investment will be hosted at the University of Edinburgh's Advanced Computing Facility in Midlothian, capitalising on the city's 60-year legacy in AI research.
The new system will vastly exceed the capacity of the university's current ARCHER2 supercomputer, allowing scientists to run complex large-scale modelling for breakthroughs in medicine and climate change.