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Microsoft commits £22bn to UK supercomputer as Big Tech unveils £31bn investment blitz

September 17, 2025

Thousands of Microsoft employees across the United States will be given unlimited days off in an overhaul of its holiday policy.

Microsoft has unveiled its largest ever UK investment, committing £22 billion over the next four years to build Britain’s biggest artificial intelligence supercomputer and expand its data centre network.

The announcement, timed to coincide with President Trump’s state visit, dwarfs other Big Tech pledges and forms the centrepiece of £31 billion in new US-led tech investment.

Half of Microsoft’s spend will go towards capital expansion, while the other half will bolster its UK operations, which already employ 6,000 people.

Brad Smith, the company’s president and vice chair, described the move as both a “vote of confidence” in Britain and a bid to deepen US–UK economic ties. Two years ago, Smith had publicly criticised Britain’s business climate after the competition watchdog temporarily blocked Microsoft’s Activision takeover. “The climate in London today is so much more hospitable to investment than it was a few years ago,” he told reporters, adding: “We’re focused on British pounds, not empty tech promises.”

Microsoft will partner with British data centre operator NScale to build the new supercomputer, which will run on 23,000 of Nvidia’s latest AI chips. Microsoft has guaranteed to purchase capacity, ensuring financial security for the venture.

At the same time, Nvidia confirmed it will allocate 120,000 of its GPUs to the UK – its largest European deployment to date – with half being the ultra-powerful Grace-Blackwell Ultra series. The GPUs will be distributed through US firm CoreWeave and NScale, with CoreWeave itself investing £1.5 billion in new UK capacity.

The hardware will underpin Stargate UK, a government-backed initiative designed to train next-generation AI models on British soil. The project mirrors the $500 billion US “Stargate” programme led by OpenAI and SoftBank. The UK version is a three-way partnership between Nvidia, NScale and OpenAI, which will use up to 31,000 GPUs by 2026 to run its top-tier models under UK data rules.

David Hogan, vice president of enterprise at Nvidia, said: “We have the right conditions for rapid AI growth and innovation in the UK. The only thing that’s been missing is infrastructure. This will truly make the UK an AI maker, not an AI taker.”

Google also revealed an extra £5 billion of UK investment, including support for its London-based DeepMind unit, while Salesforce pledged £1.4 billion and BlackRock £500 million for data centres.

Campaigners, however, have warned against allowing US companies to dominate Britain’s digital future. In a joint letter, 46 civil society and industry groups urged Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to defend copyright law, competition rules, and sovereign data sets. “The UK must not allow its digital future to be dictated by a small coterie of US Big Tech firms,” they said.

Despite the warnings, ministers are expected to hail the package as proof of Britain’s global appeal for technology investment and as a foundation for economic growth powered by AI.