The resignation of Sir Keir Starmer as prime minister on Monday was not entirely a surprise given his struggle for approval ratings, various plots to power from other figures in the Labour Party and the looming presence of Reform UK.
Despite this, the UK under Starmer’s governance could hardly be considered being in the state of collapse and disaster that would typically result in the resignation of a prime minister two years after a dominant electoral victory.
The tech industry, relatively speaking, can be considered fairly well-managed during Starmer’s time in Number 10, though not everyone will agree.
Advocates of the AI sector saw unquestioning support from government, with the UK now home to one of the largest and most important AI ecosystems in the world.
Investment has also seen plenty of attention.
The Mansion House Reforms, started initially at the later stages of the Conservative’s reign, have boosted the supply of UK-based capital going towards startups and scaleups.
The British Business Bank has been handed a bigger budget and a long-term strategy to encourage growth throughout the UK’s nations and regions.
Foreign investment in the UK is also particularly strong, both in terms of international investors into tech and state-to-state trade deals agreed with major international players including India, China, the European Union and even the highly volatile US under Trump.
The Industrial Strategy placed deliberate intention to support the UK’s most promising sectors for the future.
State funding bodies like UKRI were given the stability they needed with planning in terms of decades not years and while the public markets have not seen much tech activity, firms were given new opportunities for investment with the launch of the PISCES scheme.
Starmer showed a ‘clear commitment’
One area of the tech industry that appears to be praising Starmer’s legacy is deep tech. As mentioned previously, the Industrial Strategy demonstrated the government’s intention to support sectors including advanced manufacturing, clean energy industries and frontier technologies including semiconductors and quantum computing.
“Over the past few years, Starmer’s Government has shown a clear commitment to building the foundations for the UK’s next generation of technology companies,” said Sebastian Weidt, chief executive of Universal Quantum. “For deep tech startups like Universal Quantum, that support matters enormously.
“The Starmer government’s investment in the UK’s quantum ecosystem, including through the National Quantum Technologies Programme and additional funding commitments, has helped give companies the confidence to scale, attract talent and compete globally.”
Alexander Jantzen, co-founder and COO of Aquark Technologies echoed these comments, though noted the UK’s broad support for quantum across political lines.
“The UK’s commitment to quantum has held firm across parties and leadership contests, even as governments have faced difficult choices on spending and priorities. That cross-party consensus is rare, and it matters for both the long-term competitiveness and security of the country and its critical infrastructure,” Jantzen said.
For all the successes that the UK tech industry has seen over the last two years, it must continue as ever to look forward.
Looking ahead
The majority opinion is that Andy Burnham, former mayor of Greater Manchester, will be the UK’s next prime minister. His decisive win in the Makerfield by-election and his relative popularity with party members leaves him the most likely candidate.
With that in mind, figures from the tech industry have shared their hopes and warnings for Burnham, or indeed anyone else who will find themselves in charge.
“Looking ahead, the incoming Prime Minister has an opportunity to be even more ambitious,” said Richard Potter, GM and VP at UiPath.
“The US has demonstrated how a thriving technology sector can become a major contributor to national productivity and GDP growth, and the UK should seek to capture more of that potential. That means creating the conditions for technology businesses to scale, while also ensuring appropriate AI governance is in place.”
For Scott Dawson, the chief executive of the banking infrastructure group Decta, the top challenge for the next prime minister will be reversing the perception that Downing Street is a revolving door.
“That perception filters down into a general view that the UK is a basket case in general. Despite what the facts might say, there are a lot of otherwise intelligent people who believe that the country is crime-ridden, prone to political unrest and poorly managed,” Dawson said.
For Dawson, reversing the perception “means serving out the full length of their term, which in turn means avoiding the rank unpopularity that dogged Starmer’s prime ministership by, more than anything, putting more money in people’s pockets and funding basic services (and not so basic services like libraries and leisure centres)”.
He said: “A focus on pocketbook issues for the UK public should be welcomed by the UK’s payments and fintech industry – when people aren’t overstretched they spend instead of save, and this money goes back into the economy, ultimately passing through the payments ecosystem and contributing to the founding of businesses who can become out clients.”
“I don’t imagine it will be an easy job – in fact reversing decades of managed decline sounds like one of the most difficult jobs in politics, but it’s what the country needs.”
For Peter Griffiths, founder and chairman of Argyll Data Development, the measure of success for the next prime minister will be if they can maintain the UK’s existing momentum when it comes to AI infrastructure.
“As AI becomes increasingly important to economic growth, national security and public services, attention must turn to the infrastructure that underpins it. Compute, energy capacity and digital infrastructure are becoming strategic assets in their own right,” Griffiths said.
“The next prime minister will have their own priorities and their own agenda. But Britain cannot afford to lose momentum. The countries pulling ahead are investing now in the infrastructure that AI depends on. The need for that doesn’t change when governments do.”
