Britain’s “invention agency” has pledged £50m of UK taxpayer money to US tech firms and venture capital tasks.
Dreamed up by Dominic Cummings to fund “crazy” concepts, the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria) is supposed to “restore Britain’s place as a scientific superpower”.
But a joint investigation by the Guardian and Democracy for Sale, an investigative web site, has established that greater than an eighth of the agency’s £400m in analysis and development funding over the previous two years has gone to 14 US tech firms and venture capital teams, in some instances, with no clear return for the UK or Aria.
One of these firms, Rain Neuromorphics, can be backed by the OpenAI chief government, Sam Altman, and was reported to be close to collapse final 12 months, shortly after successful Aria money. It didn’t reply to a request for remark; two of its founders seem to have left the corporate. The Guardian understands it’s nonetheless delivering a challenge for Aria.
Cecilia Rikap, an economics professor at University College London, mentioned: “Disguised as promoting moonshot projects, the government is using taxpayer money to further expand the power of the US tech ecosystem.
“This is not a surprise coming from a government that has agreed to be not only Trump’s, but also big tech’s, footman.”
Chi Onwurah, the chair of the Commons science and know-how committee, mentioned: “These reports on Aria’s spending underline the need for stronger scrutiny of the organisation, something its chair acknowledged when he appeared in front of my committee in 2025.
“The Aria Act requires the organisation to benefit the UK by driving economic growth, supporting scientific innovation or improving quality of life. It’s unclear how funding US-based venture capital and tech firms meets these aims, or aligns with the government’s commitment to regional innovation.”
In response to a question from the Guardian, Aria mentioned its “mission is to unlock breakthroughs that benefit the UK, which means funding the best ideas across universities, startups and private companies. Over 80% of our funding goes to UK-based teams — and where we fund international organisations, it is to transfer scientific capabilities to the UK, with contractual protections ensuring the benefits flow back here.”
Transparency disclosures present it has spent a complete of £23m on 9 US tech firms. It gave an extra £6m to one other US firm, Normal Computing, which established itself within the UK solely weeks earlier than receiving the grant.
And it has given £29.4m to three US venture capital teams, together with Pillar VC, tasked with creating a “diverse range of bespoke activities” to determine and help early-stage UK tech expertise.
These firms embody the CIC Venture Cafe Global Institute, a US enterprise that hosts occasions for entrepreneurs and has acquired £5.4m to run “venture cafes” throughout the UK; and the US agency Fifty Years, which can run a 14-week course that teaches scientists how to begin firms. It will earn £7m to run the course six instances for 50 college students.
Pillar VC included within the UK sooner or later earlier than Aria gave it a£10.9m contract. One different US group, Renaissance Philanthropy, backed by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, additionally included within the UK shortly earlier than receiving £13.3m from Aria.
“Renaissance Philanthropy is excited to be working with several governments on building their R&D ecosystems including the UK, Germany, Japan, and the US,” it mentioned.
“We have been progressing several UK-based, UK-focused programmes in addition to the Activation Partnership with Aria.”
In response to a question from the Guardian, Normal Computing mentioned constructing a UK presence was a “contractual condition” for the funding, and highlighted its contributions to the financial system: “Normal has reinvested approximately 150% of the award value back into the UK through salaries, operations and continued growth,” it mentioned.
Fifty Years mentioned: “We thought UK scientists would benefit from our 5050 programme to help them start companies, but as a small 12-person team, we wouldn’t have been able to bring it to the UK without Aria’s partnership,” including that it had funded two firms which have come out of its UK programme.
CIC mentioned: “We established a UK entity in order to operate efficiently within the country and pay all applicable local taxes,” including that the first beneficiaries of its work are the “UK innovation ecosystem and UK taxpayers”.
Pillar didn’t reply to a request for remark.
When Aria was arrange, it was controversially exempt from freedom of data legal guidelines, and, for the primary years of its operation, it revealed no particulars about its grantees. Set up to be free from “red tape”, it stays unclear if Aria has strict tips on how a lot of its funding can go to non-UK companies.
A latest report by the environmental group ETC described Aria as “bringing Silicon Valley’s free-market fundamentalism and its ‘move fast and break things’ ethos to disrupt the buttoned-up British science establishment”.
A quantity of the US firms Aria has funded seem to be early-stage ventures. Several of these, similar to MorphoAI and Sangtera, have already got highly effective US backers together with the incubator Y Combinator and theNational Science Foundation, a federal company.
Were they to obtain a breakthrough, it’s unclear how, or if, that advance would straight profit the UK. ARIA insisted that it has “contractual protections” guaranteeing advantages stream again to Britain, however it’s not clear how this works in observe.
The agency’s “standard approach” will not be to take shares or mental property rights within the firms that it funds, in accordance to its web site. The Guardian understands ARIA requires a royalty payment to be paid to the UK on any IP commercialised outdoors the UK.
In response to a question from the Guardian, MorphoAI mentioned: “The Aria grant has created incredible opportunity for MorphoAI, allowing us to grow into the UK. Over 50% of our employees are now based in the UK, with the majority of our operations running from our London office, the fastest growing part of the business.”
Sangtera didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Onwurah mentioned Aria’s alternative to fund US tech firms doubtlessly got here on the price of funding untapped potential within the UK. “Aria allocates only a small share of its funding outside London and the south-east – the West Midlands, for example, receives just 0.8%. It’s disappointing to see reports of Aria’s substantial investment overseas whilst such stark regional imbalances persist at home,” she mentioned.
Rikap mentioned US tech firms “are intellectual monopolies that present themselves as contributing to public knowledge, all the while finding ways to monetise it”.
“Data and knowledge are co-produced with universities and local companies but always following the priorities of big tech, so that whatever new research is developed, it remains within the platforms and ecosystems that they control.”