What Britain needs to do to grasp its big opportunities in AI
英国要抓住 AI 重大机遇，需要做什么
For a start, the government needs to think bigger首先，政府需要更有雄心BRITAIN’S ECONOMY is far weaker for being outside the EU. Its booming AI sector may be a notable exception. So far this year British technology startups have raised over $14.5bn in venture capital, more than all other major European markets combined. Britain has 33 AI unicorns, startups valued at $1bn-plus, more than France, Germany and the Netherlands put together, though France has the biggest in Mistral, which makes continental Europe’s most advanced AI models. They include Wayve, whose driverless cars will be coming to London’s streets through Uber, a ride-hailing app. “It’s definitely a Brexit dividend,” says Keegan McBride of the Tony Blair Institute, a think-tank.英国经济因为脱离欧盟而变得弱得多。但其蓬勃发展的 AI 行业，可能是一个明显例外。今年到目前为止，英国科技初创公司已经获得超过 145 亿美元风险投资，比其他所有欧洲主要市场加起来还多。英国拥有 33 家 AI 独角兽，也就是估值超过 10 亿美元的初创公司，数量超过法国、德国和荷兰总和。不过，法国拥有其中规模最大的 Mistral，它开发了欧洲大陆最先进的 AI 模型。英国 AI 独角兽包括 Wayve，其无人驾驶汽车将通过叫车应用 Uber 登上伦敦街头。智库 Tony Blair Institute 的 Keegan McBride 说：“这绝对是 Brexit 红利。”One benefit is that Britain is not beholden to the EU’s stringent AI Act, which critics say holds firms and their customers to burdensome standards. The British government has favoured innovation over regulation. Yet while Britain feels freer, in reality any ambitious AI firm will want to sell to the bloc, so must comply with the act anyway, says Alexandru Voica of Synthesia, one of Britain’s biggest generative-AI firms. In some cases, Brexit has made things “harder not easier”. Mr Voica points to steep visa fees and not being able to hire people fast enough as one reason the firm is now opening offices in mainland Europe. On June 9th the British government launched a global-talent scheme to help reduce such frictions.一个好处是，英国不受欧盟严格的《AI 法案》约束。批评者认为，该法案让企业及其客户承担繁重标准。英国政府更偏向创新，而不是监管。然而，Synthesia 的 Alexandru Voica 表示，虽然英国感觉更自由，但现实中任何有雄心的 AI 公司都想把产品卖到欧盟市场，因此无论如何都必须遵守该法案。Synthesia 是英国最大的生成式 AI 公司之一。在某些情况下，Brexit 让事情“更难，而不是更容易”。Voica 指出，高昂签证费以及无法足够快地招聘人才，是公司如今在欧洲大陆开设办公室的原因之一。6 月 9 日，英国政府推出了一项全球人才计划，以帮助减少这些摩擦。Great ideas, even when stripped of Brussels’s red tape, still do not always turn into action. “AI growth zones”, designated areas where the government aims to build data centres more rapidly by fast-tracking planning approvals and prioritising grid connections, remain little more than labels. “The UK has a huge strategic advantage [over the EU],” says Pascal Levensohn, a venture capitalist helping to set up an innovation hub in Cambridge. “It hasn’t taken advantage of it.”伟大的想法，即使摆脱了布鲁塞尔的繁文缛节，也并不总能转化为行动。“AI 增长区”仍然不过是标签而已。这些区域是政府指定的地方，目标是通过加快规划审批、优先安排电网连接，更快建设数据中心。正在帮助剑桥建立创新中心的风险投资人 Pascal Levensohn 说：“英国相对于欧盟拥有巨大战略优势，但它没有利用好这一点。”If the European comparison flatters Britain, then the American one humbles it. This month the British government celebrated £6bn, $8.1bn, pledged for investment in AI infrastructure. That is pocket change compared with the $700bn the four big American hyperscalers will probably spend on capital investment in 2026 alone.如果与欧洲相比会让英国显得不错，那么与美国相比则会让它显得谦卑。本月，英国政府庆祝获得 60 亿英镑，也就是 81 亿美元的 AI 基础设施投资承诺。但与四大美国超大规模云服务商仅在 2026 年可能投入的 7000 亿美元资本支出相比，这只是零钱。In April OpenAI, the American firm powering ChatGPT, announced that it would be pausing Stargate UK, an infrastructure project, in part because industrial energy costs are four times higher than in Texas. The recent order by the Trump administration to prevent any non-American from accessing Anthropic’s latest models, notably Claude Fable 5, shows how access to frontier AI is at the pleasure of the American government. “Europe 2031”, an essay by a group of AI experts imagining how the continent will fare if it doesn’t take the technology more seriously, argues that Brexit’s biggest advantage may be that the British can “broker bilateral AI deals with Washington more easily”.4 月，为 ChatGPT 提供技术支持的美国公司 OpenAI 宣布，将暂停 Stargate UK 这一基础设施项目，部分原因是英国工业能源成本比得克萨斯高出四倍。Trump 政府最近下令阻止任何非美国人访问 Anthropic 最新模型，尤其是 Claude Fable 5，这显示出，能否访问前沿 AI 取决于美国政府是否允许。一群 AI 专家在《Europe 2031》一文中设想，如果欧洲不更认真对待这项技术，未来会怎样。他们认为，Brexit 最大的优势可能是英国人可以“更容易与华盛顿达成双边 AI 协议”。Maik up your mind拿定主意吧Britain still has immense opportunities in AI. A lot of the fundamental science behind today’s models was done by British boffins, one, Geoffrey Hinton, is known as AI’s godfather. Many of the co-founders and top executives at leading labs are British, from Jack Clark at Anthropic to Mustafa Suleyman at Microsoft. Wayve is part of a clutch of promising AI firms massing around DeepMind, Google’s AI company led by Sir Demis Hassabis, and based in London’s King’s Cross. The world will be far less informed about the risks of frontier AI if AISI, the British government’s pioneering AI Security Institute, continues to be locked out of Anthropic’s latest models.英国在 AI 领域仍有巨大机会。今天这些模型背后的许多基础科学，都是由英国科学家完成的，其中 Geoffrey Hinton 被称为 AI 教父。许多领先实验室的联合创始人和高管都是英国人，从 Anthropic 的 Jack Clark 到 Microsoft 的 Mustafa Suleyman。Wayve 是围绕 DeepMind 聚集的一批有前景 AI 公司之一。DeepMind 是 Google 旗下 AI 公司，由 Sir Demis Hassabis 领导，总部位于伦敦 King’s Cross。如果英国政府开创性的 AI Security Institute，也就是 AISI，继续被排除在 Anthropic 最新模型之外，世界对前沿 AI 风险的了解将大打折扣。Nor does Britain need to be entirely dependent on America. Jensen Huang, the boss of Nvidia, a chipmaker, talks of the AI stack as a layer cake made up of energy, chips, infrastructure, models and applications. The greatest economic benefits, he says, lie in the top tier—where Britain is best-placed to succeed. Although in the long run access to frontier AI is imperative, most applications do not need the latest models to be useful. Data from Artificial Analysis, a benchmarking firm, suggest that DeepSeek V4 Pro, a Chinese open-source model, offers roughly three-quarters the performance of Fable 5, but at less than a sixtieth of the cost.英国也不需要完全依赖美国。芯片制造商 Nvidia 的老板 Jensen Huang 把 AI 技术栈比作一块分层蛋糕，由能源、芯片、基础设施、模型和应用组成。他说，最大的经济利益位于最上层，也就是应用层，而这正是英国最有机会成功的地方。虽然从长期看，获得前沿 AI 访问权至关重要，但大多数应用并不需要最新模型才能发挥作用。基准测试公司 Artificial Analysis 的数据显示，中国开源模型 DeepSeek V4 Pro 提供了大约相当于 Fable 5 四分之三的性能，但成本不到后者的六十分之一。To truly prosper in the world of AI, however, Britain must think bigger. It will need to fix the planning system and upgrade the grid in order to build more AI infrastructure. The government may need to stump up more than the £1.1bn it recently pledged for AI hardware. At the application layer, making the most of AI will require solving other governance challenges, such as joining up data in the health system.然而，要在 AI 世界中真正繁荣，英国必须想得更大。为了建设更多 AI 基础设施，它需要修复规划审批体系，并升级电网。政府可能需要拿出超过最近承诺用于 AI 硬件的 11 亿英镑。在应用层，要充分利用 AI，还需要解决其他治理挑战，例如打通医疗系统中的数据。Britain will have to do all this in the midst of a growing public backlash. A recent survey by researchers at King’s College London found that 57% of the British public thinks AI will lead to widespread unemployment and 22% that it will lead to civil unrest. In speeches, ministers shift awkwardly between AI’s risks and its opportunities. A better response has been to set up an AI Economics Institute, modelled on AISI, the first institute of its kind to track how AI may affect productivity, the labour market and the wider economy.英国必须在公众反弹不断增强的背景下完成所有这些。King’s College London 研究人员最近的一项调查发现，57% 的英国公众认为 AI 将导致大规模失业，22% 认为 AI 将导致社会动荡。在演讲中，部长们在 AI 风险和 AI 机会之间尴尬切换。更好的回应是设立 AI Economics Institute，这是一个仿照 AISI 建立的机构，也是首个此类机构，用来追踪 AI 可能如何影响生产率、劳动力市场和更广泛经济。In time, the government will have to grapple with social reforms as a result of AI. For now, there is other work to do. “The technological revolution is already here,” says Mr McBride. Britain has an opportunity to be a player, but it risks becoming a spectator.随着时间推移，政府将不得不应对由 AI 引发的社会改革。但眼下，还有其他工作要做。McBride 说：“技术革命已经到来。”英国有机会成为参与者，但也有可能沦为旁观者。全篇重点词汇：beholden /bɪˈhəʊldən/ 受制于；欠人情的。obliged or dependent on someone or something.red tape /ˌred ˈteɪp/ 繁文缛节；官僚程序。excessive rules or bureaucracy that slow things down.hyperscaler /ˈhaɪpəˌskeɪlə/ 超大规模云服务商。a large technology company operating massive cloud and data-centre infrastructure.frontier AI /ˈfrʌntɪə ˌeɪ ˈaɪ/ 前沿 AI。the most advanced and capable artificial-intelligence systems.backlash /ˈbæklæʃ/ 强烈反弹；抵制。a strong negative reaction against a policy, trend or development.
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