--- title: "UK tech chief wants pension funds to back AI startups" url: https://daily.dev/posts/uk-tech-chief-wants-pension-funds-to-back-ai-startups-apln3wvzj source_url: https://thenextweb.com/news/uk-tech-secretary-vows-to-push-pension-funds-into-british-ai-startups type: article source: "The Next Web" published: 2026-06-12T11:24:12.173Z updated: 2026-06-12T11:24:33.983Z tags: ["ai", "anthropic"] reading_time: 3 upvotes: 0 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # UK tech chief wants pension funds to back AI startups **[The Next Web](https://daily.dev/sources/tnw)** · 3 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary UK Technology Secretary Liz Kendall has pledged legal reforms to direct pension fund capital into British AI startups, building on a voluntary accord where 17 large UK pension providers agreed to invest at least 10% of defined-contribution default funds in private markets by 2030, with 5% earmarked for domestic assets — potentially unlocking £25 billion. Chancellor Rachel Reeves has also won parliamentary authority to mandate domestic investment allocations. Despite these ambitions, American companies dominate UK government AI contracts: Anthropic won a GOV.UK assistant contract, and Palantir secured a £240.6 million MoD analytics deal, with its £330 million NHS contract now under political fire over data sovereignty concerns. A £1.1 billion AI hardware plan was also announced, though critics note most UK AI infrastructure still runs on American hardware and key British chipmakers like Graphcore have been acquired by foreign buyers. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AMD, Nebius and Starmer pour billions into UK AI at LTW](https://daily.dev/posts/amd-nebius-and-starmer-pour-billions-into-uk-ai-at-ltw-vktgmfpdt) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [UK government will buy tech to boost AI sector in $130M growth push](https://daily.dev/posts/uk-government-will-buy-tech-to-boost-ai-sector-in-130m-growth-push-4fzus5e59) · Ars Technica · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [UK plans to buy AI chips from British firms to stop them leaving for the US](https://daily.dev/posts/uk-plans-to-buy-ai-chips-from-british-firms-to-stop-them-leaving-for-the-us-wobcqq1rw) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [UK commits £1.3bn to AI hardware, skills, and justice reform](https://daily.dev/posts/uk-commits-1-3bn-to-ai-hardware-skills-and-justice-reform-qr2znn6l8) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai](https://daily.dev/tags/ai), [#anthropic](https://daily.dev/tags/anthropic) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/uk-tech-chief-wants-pension-funds-to-back-ai-startups-apln3wvzj)