Prosper UK has published the findings of a roundtable with AI firms, investors, technologists and policy experts on how the UK can get more economic growth out of artificial intelligence and handle the disruption it brings to work and public services.

Businesses and experts were clear that the opportunity is real and that the UK starts from a position of strength, but that the lead will not hold on its own. Take-up across the economy is still slow and the technology is moving faster than the policy around it.

They wanted government to lead, setting out what an AI-native UK should look like across public services and business, and to invest at the scale the prize implies. One study puts that prize at £550 billion by 2035, worth around two per cent on annual growth.

Businesses were blunt about the gap between ambition and money. Government has pointed to roughly £45 billion of savings from AI, they noted, yet only about £2 billion has been committed, half of it to quantum.

On regulation, businesses pressed for better rules rather than fewer, and were critical of the government’s AI growth labs, which lift the rules for a few hand-picked firms. Where the rules hold good companies back, they were clear, the answer is to change them for everyone rather than pick favourites. The biggest opportunity of all, several said, is in the public sector.

Read the full publication below.