UK Sovereign AI Fund Chair James Wise Urges Government to Think Like an Investor

James Wise, chair of the United Kingdom’s £500 million ($675 million) Sovereign AI Fund and a partner at Balderton Capital, has urged ministers to adopt an investor mindset as they try to accelerate growth in the domestic AI industry. In comments reported on 2 September 2026, he said Britain often struggles to support small startups and has not delivered the kind of early government contracts that helped U.S. firms such as SpaceX and Palantir become highly valuable companies, arguing that innovation in U.S. procurement played a decisive role. Bloomberg