UK government to offer £100m fund for AI startups tackling public services.

# UK AI firms get £100m public push Source: [https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/uk-ai-firms-get-100m-public-push-9298458](https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/uk-ai-firms-get-100m-public-push-9298458) [Katarina Lukač](https://es.linkedin.com/in/katalukac/en) ### Katarina Lukač Published Sep 1, 2026 UK AI startups that can help improve public services will be able to compete for a share of a new[£100m government fund](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services)\. The programme targets priorities including healthcare, cyber security and defence, with winning projects eligible for contracts worth £250,000 to £10m\. Most deals are expected to fall between £1m and £3m, while smaller firms may[receive upfront payments](https://www.ft.com/content/5a10fc78-9a3e-4f12-81e3-dc843b529948?syn-25a6b1a6=1)\. The announcement follows criticism of a £330m, seven\-year NHS contract awarded to US software company Palantir by the previous government\. The UK will also open its new AI Economics Institute, led by MIT professor[Simon Johnson](https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-johnson-17b40645/), to collaboration with G7 partners\. --- ## Editors’ Picks --- 1. A significant step forward for the UK’s Sovereign AI ambition\. The newly announced £100m competition is designed not only to accelerate AI innovation, but also to help UK AI startups and SMEs scale by giving them opportunities to demonstrate their technologies against real public\-sector challenges\. The focus spans areas including NHS productivity, defence, compute efficiency and, particularly importantly, Safe AI Agent Adoption\. As Agentic AI moves from experimentation towards more autonomous operational systems, trust, assurance, resilience and effective governance will be essential to responsible adoption\. This is a strong example of AI for good — combining sovereign capability, support for UK innovators, responsible AI and real\-world public impact\. Read more:[https://lnkd\.in/eWiHJ3Dc](https://lnkd.in/eWiHJ3Dc?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#SovereignAI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fsovereignai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#AgenticAI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fagenticai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#ResponsibleAI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fresponsibleai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#TrustworthyAI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Ftrustworthyai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#AIAssurance](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Faiassurance&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#AIForGood](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Faiforgood&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#UKAI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fukai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#AIStartups](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Faistartups&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#ArtificialIntelligence](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fartificialintelligence&trk=news_storyline_guest-text) [https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egov%2Euk%2Fgovernment%2Fnews%2F100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services%3F&urlhash=0CxA&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egov%2Euk%2Fgovernment%2Fnews%2F100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services%3F&urlhash=0CxA&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) [£100 million competition to back British AI companies to fix public servicesgov\.uk](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egov%2Euk%2Fgovernment%2Fnews%2F100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services%3F&urlhash=0CxA&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) [https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egov%2Euk%2Fgovernment%2Fnews%2F100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services%3F&urlhash=0CxA&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egov%2Euk%2Fgovernment%2Fnews%2F100-million-competition-to-back-british-ai-companies-to-fix-public-services%3F&urlhash=0CxA&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) 2. £100m of UK government contracts open to British AI startups in healthcare, defence, compute and AI assurance\. 🇬🇧 The[Sovereign AI](https://www.linkedin.com/company/uksovereignai?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)Fund is delivering on the government's pledge to be a first customer for UK innovators\. It's buying novel AI capability directly from the startups building it, in contracts from £250k to £10m\. So far, public sector AI spend has overwhelmingly gone to a handful of large multinational suppliers\. This new R&D Procurement Scheme is a deliberate attempt to route it to smaller, faster British companies instead\. This is not quite a grant, it's a tender – but non\-dilutive and designed for startups\. You keep your IP with no exclusivity, and you get a government department as an early customer\. Four opening challenges: ⚙️ Public compute efficiency from[Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/department-for-business-innovation-science-and-trade?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)and[Advanced Research \+ Invention Agency \(ARIA\)](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/advanced-research-and-invention-agency?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)🛡️ AI integration across defence from[UK Ministry of Defence](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/uk-ministry-of-defence?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)🔐 Safe adoption of AI agents from[National Cyber Security Centre](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/national-cyber-security-centre?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)🏥 NHS productivity from[Department of Health and Social Care](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/dhsc?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)📅 Open supplier briefing: 7 September 📝 Process: submit an EOI to join the Approved Supplier List – reviews are targeted within 2 weeks ⏳ Three full proposal deadlines: 1 October / 1 December / 1 February, each with a decision within 1 month Please share to make sure the UK's best AI startups make the most of this opportunity\! \-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\-\- Follow[Pitchwits](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/pitchwits?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)for more news and insights on R&D and innovation funding\. 3. Apparently, government didn’t take the Bank Holiday off\! While many of us were making the most of the long weekend, the Government launched the first four competitions under its new £100 million Sovereign AI R&D Procurement Scheme\. The initial challenges cover: • NHS productivity • AI integration in defence environments • public\-compute efficiency • AI\-agent security and resilience What caught my procurement eye, however, was the commercial model\. The scheme is intended to lower some of the barriers that routinely exclude innovative SMEs from public contracts\. Upfront payments may be available where appropriate, suppliers retain the intellectual property they create, and government acts as an early customer for demonstrator\-stage technology\. That is potentially significant\. Procurement can enable innovation—or quietly suffocate it with financial\-standing requirements, risk transfer and contractual machinery designed around established suppliers\. The real test will be whether the scheme can combine pace and flexibility with: • a defensible boundary between qualifying R&D and ordinary technology procurement; • transparent and properly documented evaluation; • milestone\-based control of upfront public money; • robust data, security, interoperability and exit provisions; and • a credible route from successful prototype to competitively procured deployment at scale\. “Cutting red tape” should not mean cutting governance\. It should mean designing governance around the actual risks\. A genuinely interesting development—and apparently one too important to leave until Tuesday\. Government announcement:[https://lnkd\.in/eCXZkq24](https://lnkd.in/eCXZkq24?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#PublicProcurement](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fpublicprocurement&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#ArtificialIntelligence](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fartificialintelligence&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#Innovation](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Finnovation&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#PublicSector](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fpublicsector&trk=news_storyline_guest-text) 5. [https://uk.linkedin.com/company/entrepreneurplusuk?trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-actor-image](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/entrepreneurplusuk?trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-actor-image)1,457 followers 8hEdited 𝗕𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗶𝗻 𝗽𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗣𝗮𝗹𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗿 £𝟭\.𝟱 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 for defence AI\. It just offered British startups £𝟭𝟬𝟬 𝗺𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 to compete with it\. The government has launched its first procurement competitions under a new £𝟭𝟬𝟬𝗺 fund for homegrown AI startups working on public services\. And there’s a tension here that’s hard to miss\. British lawmakers this month called for Palantir’s £𝟯𝟯𝟬𝗺 NHS contract to be broken, citing concerns around data sovereignty\. The government is reviewing whether to walk away when a break clause comes up in 2027\. At the same time, Palantir signed a £𝟭\.𝟱𝗯 defence deal with the UK just months ago\. Elsewhere in Europe, the pushback is growing too\. Germany’s military recently left Palantir out of a defence cloud contract\. So Britain is trying to do two things at once\. Work more closely with the biggest US AI vendors in defence, while reducing dependence on that same category of companies across public services\. This £𝟭𝟬𝟬𝗺 competition is the public services side of that bet\. And the number matters more than it first appears\. Microsoft alone received £𝟭\.𝟵𝗯 of taxpayer money last financial year, roughly £𝟳𝟬 per UK household\. Against that, £100m is tiny\. But it’s also the first direct procurement route British AI startups have had into public services at anything close to this scale\. If you’re building AI for government, healthcare or other public\-sector use cases, 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗮 𝗱𝗼𝗼𝗿 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴, not another policy promise sitting in a committee room\. 𝗜𝘀 £𝟭𝟬𝟬𝗺 𝗲𝗻𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵 to shift government AI spending towards British startups, or is it still just a symbolic gesture next to what’s already going to[Microsoft](https://www.linkedin.com/company/microsoft?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)and[Palantir Technologies](https://www.linkedin.com/company/palantir-technologies?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)?[\#UKStartups](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fukstartups&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#AI](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#StartupFunding](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fstartupfunding&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#Entrepreneurship](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fentrepreneurship&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#PublicSector](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fpublicsector&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#TechPolicy](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Ftechpolicy&trk=news_storyline_guest-text) 6. Interesting read in the[Financial Times](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/financial-times?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)this weekend\. ChapsVision, a French software firm is pitching itself as Europe's sovereign alternative to Palantir for government data platforms\. Nice \! and definitely about time Europe produced some genuine competition\. It did get me thinking though, would we be ok if ChapsVision pitched and won the next iteration of the FDP? Would this address the concerns of those worried about our valuable patient[NHS England](https://uk.linkedin.com/company/nhsengland?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)data by partnering with a firm from a trusted European ally? Under what conditions are we comfortable outsourcing NHS data infrastructure to a non\-UK entity? We cant "build everything ourselves\." That's not realistic and we aren't very good at it \!\!\! We need to utilise best of breed platforms to deliver the best outcomes for our patients and citizens\. Sovereignty isn't isolation\. It's orchestration\. True data sovereignty for the NHS means choosing partners deliberately, not defaulting to vendors\. Whether that's French, Dutch, American or British shouldn't be the point\. The question is: How do we control our data relationships? If the NHS owns the how on "how" different systems talk to each other and orchestrates delivery its own terms, then we solve the sovereignty problem\.[\#nhs](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fnhs&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#fdp](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Ffdp&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#ai](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fai&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#healthtech](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fhealthtech&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#technology](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Ftechnology&trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[\#data](https://www.linkedin.com/login?session_redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Ffeed%2Fhashtag%2Fdata&trk=news_storyline_guest-text) 7. One of the great challenges for British start\-ups has been selling to our own Government \- until now\. The historical approach to procurement has often discriminated against innovative young British companies\.[Sovereign AI](https://www.linkedin.com/company/uksovereignai?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)has set out to change that, and after a lot of work, we've just launched our rapid procurement scheme \- the first of its kind in the UK\. This is £100M of contracts for British AI companies to deliver services to make our public services cheaper and more efficient\. This scheme is designed around the needs of start\-ups: No turnover minimums\. Departmental champions from day 1\. Upfront payments\. Streamlined applications\. You keep your IP\. We are launching with four initial schemes, with more to come later this year\. These are: \- Providing AI for a more productive NHS \- Integrating AI across Defence environments \- Making public compute more efficient \- Safe adoption of AI agents\. If you think you might bid for one of these, you can first check your eligibility and learn more about the schemes on the website below\.[https://lnkd\.in/eKPEQqbQ](https://lnkd.in/eKPEQqbQ?trk=news_storyline_guest-text) [https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Esovereignai%2Egov%2Euk%2Fcompute-strategic-assets&urlhash=LbuB&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Esovereignai%2Egov%2Euk%2Fcompute-strategic-assets&urlhash=LbuB&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) [Compute, Strategic Assets & Procurement \| UK Sovereign AIsovereignai\.gov\.uk](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Esovereignai%2Egov%2Euk%2Fcompute-strategic-assets&urlhash=LbuB&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) [https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Esovereignai%2Egov%2Euk%2Fcompute-strategic-assets&urlhash=LbuB&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content](https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Esovereignai%2Egov%2Euk%2Fcompute-strategic-assets&urlhash=LbuB&trk=news_storyline_guest_feed-article-content) 8. British founders tell me it's too hard to buy from govt, too hard to scale in Britain\. Today, we are moving fast to fix it 🇬🇧 The Chancellor,[Rt Hon John Healey](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/rt-hon-john-healey-72377a42b?trk=news_storyline_guest-text), has announced[Sovereign AI](https://www.linkedin.com/company/uksovereignai?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)’s £100m rapid AI R&D procurement\. If you're a founder in Britain, come build \-\- we will be on your side, and we will move quickly\. We are starting by asking our founders to take on four national challenges: an NHS with more time for patient care; defence that keeps Britain safe; compute that means British AI strength; and ideas that keep our country cyber resilient\.[James Frith MP](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/jamesfrith?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[Luke Pollard](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/pollardluke?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)[Kathleen Fisher](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/kathleen-fisher-4000964?trk=news_storyline_guest-text)Ollie W\. ## LinkedIn News