US tech giants have committed to invest billions in the UK, as the two countries unveiled a landmark deal on Tuesday focused on developing fast-growing technologies including AI and quantum computing.
Chipmaking giant Nvidia (NVDA) announced on Tuesday that alongside AI infrastructure partners Nscale, CoreWeave (CRWV) and others, it would invest £11bn ($15bn) in UK AI factories.
Microsoft (MSFT) also said that it plans to pump $30bn (£21.95bn) into AI infrastructure and its ongoing operations across the UK over four years through to 2028.
Meanwhile, Alphabet’s (GOOG, GOOGL) Google announced the opening of its data centre in Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, as part of a two-year £5bn investment in the UK.
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In addition, software giant Salesforce (CRM) pledged to put a further $2bn into its UK business through 2030, extending a previous five-year investment of $4bn made in 2023.
The commitments came ahead of the UK and US revealing details of their Tech Prosperity Deal on Tuesday evening, as US president Donald Trump arrived in Britain for his state visit.
Richard Clode, portfolio manager on the global technology leaders team at Janus Henderson, said: “AI is a scale game in terms of infrastructure and scarce AI talent. The UK has the latter while these announcements give us more confidence in the UK having the former. That should pave the way for continued strong AI innovation in the UK with natural advantages versus the rest of Europe.”
With that in mind, here’s a closer look at the main companies with which US tech giants are partnering as part of their investments.
Nvidia (NVDA) said it was partnering with UK-headquartered AI-infrastructure company Nscale to scale up 300,000 of the chipmaker’s Grace Blackwell graphic processing units (GPUs) worldwide, with up to 60,000 in the UK.
Nscale has also entered into a commitment with Microsoft (MSFT) to deliver the UK’s largest AI supercomputer at its campus in Loughton, Essex. Nscale said that the site will deliver 50 megawatts (mw) of AI capacity, scalable to 90mw, and will initially house 23,040 Nvidia GB300 GPUs, which will be delivered in the first quarter of 2027.
In addition, Nscale is teaming up with ChatGPT developer OpenAI and Nvidia (NVDA) to establish Stargate UK, an infrastructure platform designed to deploy OpenAI’s technology in the UK.
Nscale, which was founded by CEO Josh Payne in 2023, has already partnered with OpenAI to launch Stargate Norway: an AI infrastructure project in Narvik aiming to deliver 100,000 Nvidia GPUs by the end of 2026.
