As AI becomes ever-more central to our country’s workforce, the UK government has joined forces with some of the world’s biggest tech firms to upskill 7.5 British people in AI by 2030.
Announced during London Tech Week, this new partnership between the UK government and companies like Amazon, Google, IBM and Salesforce is set to completely upskill an entire generation.
Growing The UK’s AI Economy
Speaking to audiences at London Tech Week, UK Technology Secretary Peter Kyle described AI as “the new economic frontier” and talked about how important it was to prepare the UK workforce for these changes.
He commented “If we want to realise AI’s incredible potential though, we need to make sure people of all ages and from all parts of the UK have the skills they need for jobs both in and with the technology – especially given we expect around 10 million workers to be using AI in their day-to-day role by 2035.”
Big Tech Companies Are Rising To The Challenge
As part of the announcement, a number of big tech companies have signed up to help the government meet its upskilling targets.
Some of the major players involved include:
Microsoft, which has committed to training 1 million UK workers in AI by the end of 2025.
IBM, which is growing its SkillsBuild platform (free skills-based learning) to offer specific AI modules.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) will continue to deliver free AI training through AWS Educate, AWS Skill Builder, and the Skills to Jobs Tech Alliance.
Salesforce, which has pledged $2.35 million to boost AI and digital literacy through a network of smaller, grassroots organisations.
Sage and SAS, which have committed to providing high-quality AI training for teams and workers that want to boost their confidence.
Across the board, big tech executives rallied in support of the initiative, committing to helping the government upskill the UK workforce.
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New Government Training Programmes Launch
Alongside the partnership with big tech firms, the government also announced their TechFirst programme. Through this, they have pledged £187 million to help 1 million students access learning resources to train them for “careers of the future”.
Through their initiative, which they call TechYouth, the government plans to make sure every secondary school in the UK gets new AI learning resources over the next 3 years. Prime Minister Keir Starmer commented that this would help students from all backgrounds have access to high-quality jobs in the tech sector.
Commenting on this, he said “Too many children from working families like the one I grew up in are written off. I am determined to end that.”
A Billion Pound AI Boost
Alongside the upskilling push, Starmer also announced a £1 billion investment into UK computing in order to make sure that the UK becomes an “AI maker, not an AI taker”.
And for people who worry about AI taking their jobs, he commented that the public must “push past” these concerns and instead focus in building the skills to use it.
AI Driving UK Investment
Back in January, the government announced the AI Opportunities Action Plan, which planned to outline how AI would be used to boost the UK economy and drive productivity in the public sector.
According to a press release on gov.uk, in the 12 months since the government took office, the UK has attracted more than £44 billion in AI investment, with 13,250 jobs being created since the programme was announced.
And with so many big tech companies now involved, there seems to be a clear plan to helping upskill the UK population to drive this AI revolution.
As Leon Butler of IBM put it, “Creating a workforce that understands digital technologies will be crucial to boost AI adoption and unlock its huge benefits for business and society.”
A Global AI Superpower
As AI becomes more central to our lives, the government is looking for ways to help UK workers upskill in this fast-growing technology.
By bringing together some of the biggest tech companies in the world, the government is making a clear commitment to boosting the UK workforce of the future.
