US tech giants invest in UK, Microsoft commits billions, OpenAI launches 'Stargate UK'

Several major US tech companies, including Microsoft, OpenAI, Nvidia, Google, and Salesforce, have pledged more than 31 billion pounds in new investments for the UK. The money will go toward data centers, AI infrastructure, quantum computing, and related projects.

The announcements came during US President Donald Trump's state visit to London. His delegation included OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said his government will speed up approvals for data centers and make it easier to connect to the national power grid, which is among the most expensive in Europe. The government is also creating a new "AI Growth Zone" in northeast England to generate jobs.

OpenAI brings Stargate to the UK

One of the headline projects is Stargate UK, an OpenAI-led infrastructure effort developed with Nvidia and British data center operator Nscale. It is designed to give the UK sovereign computing capacity for critical applications, including finance, research, and national security.

The initial build will include up to 8,000 GPUs from Nvidia's new Blackwell line, with plans to expand to 31,000 chips over time. Sites will include the new AI Growth Zone in Cobalt Park.

OpenAI also announced the launch of the OpenAI Academy in the UK. The program aims to expand AI training and provide reskilling opportunities for up to 7.5 million workers by 2030.

Microsoft, Nvidia, and others commit billions

Microsoft says it will invest $30 billion in the UK over four years, including building a supercomputer near London with more than 23,000 GPUs in partnership with Nscale. Nvidia is contributing to an 11 billion pound program to expand both British and global data centers, with plans to deploy 120,000 AI accelerators in the country by 2026.

US cloud provider CoreWeave pledged an additional 1.5 billion pounds for UK operations, including a new data center in Scotland. That comes on top of a previously announced 1 billion pound commitment. Salesforce is increasing its total UK investment to $6 billion. Google will spend 5 billion pounds over the next two years on a new data center in Hertfordshire. Investor BlackRock is also putting in 500 million pounds for UK infrastructure.

At the same time, British pharmaceutical giant GSK announced it will invest $30 billion in the US over the next five years, including funding for a new biologics facility and clinical trials.