Wired UK – March 2019

START 

First: the UK’s Tech Nation Visa Scheme
is one of the most generous in the world
for extraordinary individuals – and the
number of available visas has doubled
over the past two years. This is a real
win that the sector needs to defend
and, if possible, extend.
The second reason is Britain’s excep-
tionally strong universities. Times
Higher Education ranks Oxford and
Cambridge as the world’s top two univer-
sities, with Imperial College London
joining them in the top ten. These and
other institutions will continue to
provide the tech industry with world-
class talent, particularly in areas such
as AI. In turn, this means that disruption

means that startups and investors will

have to be louder than ever.

Finally, markets. The UK is leaving the

world’s largest single market, but this

affects tech startups less than many other

companies. Israel, the original “Startup

Nation”, has demonstrated that to

begin life in a small market forces entre-

preneurs to think global from day one.

Importantly, leaving the single market

will have the least impact on the most

ambitious startups. The EU’s regulatory

harmony has always been somewhat

offset for startups by its linguistic and

cultural diversity. In any case, these

companies place no geographic bounds

on their aspirations. The UK’s prosaic but

fundamental strengths – a favourable

time zone and the English language –

will keep the country attractive as a

springboard to launch a global company.

What does this all mean for the UK’s

comparative advantages? Post-Brexit

Britain will be an excellent place for

startups that need access to abundant,

patient capital, world-leading talent

in areas of cutting-edge research and

large global customer bases. While

many companies fit the bill, the model

is particularly attractive for “deep tech”

startups. These are companies working

with new technologies, such as AI, virtual

reality or synthetic biology. As the

emerging success of UK companies such

as Darktrace, Improbable and Tractable

shows, the UK has strong foundations

in this area. It’s on those foundations

that the whole ecosystem – founders and

VCs, of course, but also the government

and universities – will need to build for

UK tech to continue to prosper.

The period since the referendum

has been one of great uncertainty –

and that’s likely to continue for many

years. Whatever the eventual political

settlement, if the UK plays to its

strengths, it will be able to not only

save its technology ecosystem, but

also take decisive steps to becoming

the world’s Deep Tech Nation.

to higher-education institutions is the

biggest hidden Brexit risk for startups:

the sector must ally with universities

to mitigate the worst hits to research

funding and collaboration.

Another risk has less to do with

immigration rules and more to do

with the national mood music. Even if

talented people can get into the country,

does a post-Brexit Britain sound like

somewhere they’ll be welcome? The

UK government has done little to send

a much-needed welcome message; this

Drone Assassinations

Culinary Anthropology

Picard Reboot

Frustrums

SpotMini

TIRED

Steerable Bullets

Xenobiology

Palm Reboot

Prismatoids

Aibo

EXPIRED

DN A-Targe ted Poisons

Bot Psychology

Bartlet Reboot

Scutoids

Open Source Mars Rovers

WIRED

‘The UK’s Tech

Nation Visa Scheme

is one of the most

generous in the world’

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