According to this article HERE the government is today announcing funding of £4 billion to be spent on R & D as a way of boosting the economy and making Britain a "leader" in artificial intelligence and driverless cars. Details are not immediately available but let me speculate. Firstly, it will be spent over a long period, perhaps ten years or more, so the money will be spread very thinly indeed.
Secondly, it will do no good at all. We do not have a single volume conventional car maker let alone a manufacturer of driverless ones. How we will achieve global leadership is one of those pipe dreams beloved of politicians and the money is just a way of absolving themselves of future criticism. Dyson, an importer of vacuum cleaners is said to be working on an electric car which will no doubt be driverless but he is years behind Tesla, has never made a car before and his attempt to break into washing machines a few years ago ended in failure. Dream on.
As for artificial intelligence, I am not aware of any British companies who are leaders in this field in any case, but leaving that aside our own industry in general has an appalling record in investment in automation as this post about physical robots shows (HERE). Out of total global sales of 253,000 robots in 2015, the UK managed a pathetic 1,645. So, we need to both create world leaders in AI as well as persuading industry here to invest in it. Japan, China, Korea, Germany, France and the USA are miles ahead of us and will not only continue to invest more than we do but will probably do so even while the £4 billion is being spent.
Whilst writing this post, I am listening to Greg Clarke, the Business minister speaking on Radio 4 this morning and he talks about the British car Industry as if it is British. He cannot bring himself to admit it is virtually all foreign owned. He is talking also of productivity and the need to improve it with investment in training and infrastructure. In other words it is the same old story that successive governments have given us for forty years or more. Mr Clarke himself announced £17 million only in March this year to help "build on our world-leading reputation", that's the one we must have lost between then and now.
The UK car industry was rescued by foreign companies like Nissan, Honda, Toyota, BMW and Tata and specifically because of our membership of the EU, the bloc which we are now leaving. This is bound to reduce investment and no amount of government money will replace it. The Brexiteers don't seem to have any intelligence, artificial or otherwise.
