Seb Johnson (@SebJohnsonUK) — posts, photos & videos

@SebJohnsonUK

Nik Storonsky at Wave:

“Our American dream - I mean, in this case, European dream - would be to build a global tech company similar to Meta, Google or OpenAI, but out of Europe"

What a quote.

LETS GO @NStoronsky

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@SebJohnsonUK

This is why Revolut is going to be Europe’s first $1 trillion company.

Also, the attitude and culture we need a lot more of.

NICe

Gordon Gekko@ownsomeshares · Oct 8

Interviewer: "Are you coming for Jamie Dimon's lunch?"

@NStoronsky: "His dinner."

My man. 🤣🤣🤣

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@SebJohnsonUK

This is huge news.

It shows how effective the UK tech ecosystem can be when it rallies together.

Shout out to those who have been fighting to get this over the line or signed the open letter @Dom_Hallas, @inherent_labs, @MattEvantic, @mati, @vriparbelli, @ac_edwards_1, @DanAkarca, @_rockt

Dom Hallas@Dom_Hallas · Oct 9

NON COMPETES BANNED

Today, the PM has announced that his Government will legislate to functionally ban non-compete agreements for startups and scaleups in the UK or as he called it - the Bosman ruling for ruling for the innovation sector' 😂

At the @StartupCltn been working on this for months and we think it’s a huge potential unlock for our tech ecosystem.

Here’s what you need to know…

- Measures to functionally ban non-competes for startups and scaleups in the UK are going to be set out.
- There will also be consultation on a wider set of restrictive practices including gardening leave.
- More detail on these plans at the budget in a few weeks (Wednesday 28th October) including a timetable for consultation with a view to legislation in the coming months.

We think this is a huge move and so do lots of friends including so many of the great founders that signed the letter with Inherent just the other week.

Why? Because talent matters and mobile talent means startups can build. The Valley was built on free-flowing talent. In the UK, we’re now seeing our own versions of this story with companies being built from alumni of both homegrown firms like Revolut and beyond. But we need that to move faster. Hiring and building faster means British startups and scaleups can grow faster. Barriers to that slow our ecosystem down.

We won’t pretend it will be perfect, and people (including some of our friends but also lots of fairly vested interests too) will have a right to disagree. But we think that startups will thrive and win in a faster paced Britain.

So we are delighted with the progress today - as part of a strong speech by the PM outlining his ambition for building the world’s leading innovation nation including more on tax, growing companies outside London and more. But this is the start, not the end of the process. The announcement launches a consultation. It doesn't mean the issue is settled. How far reform goes, and what it looks like on the ground, is still to be decided.

The Prime Minister today has done something that can materially impact the trajectory of the UK tech ecosystem and with it our economy - but only if we make sure it’s delivered. So, the real work starts now.

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LETS GO

Dom Hallas@Dom_Hallas · Oct 9

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This is HUGE

Remarkable work from the @inherent_labs team, as well as the ecosystem around them

Dan Bloom@danbloom1 · Oct 8

EXCL: The government is planning to commit to a ban on "non-compete" clauses that are rife in high-flying tech and City workers' contracts

Ministers think they're a barrier to start-ups. Andy Burnham may announce tomorrow

But govt is set to stop short of confirming the details

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Andy Burnham also studied English literature.

It is the year of the English grads.

Seb Johnson@SebJohnsonUK · Oct 7

Be Jack Clark (british cofounder of Anthropic):

> Grow up in Brighton
> Study English Literature & Creative Writing at University of East Anglia
> Become a journalist covering technology, finance and environmental issues
> Double down on tech
> Become world's only "distributed systems reporter" at The Register
> Move to Bloomberg, become their neural network reporter
> Interview a Google researcher named Dario Amodei about a paper called "Concrete Problems in AI Safety" which changes your life
> Leave journalism and join OpenAI in strategy & comms (2016)
> Rise to Policy Director
> Start writing Import AI, a newsletter, on the side
> Leave openai in 2021 with Dario, Daniela and four others
> Co-found Anthropic - a company with no product, no revenue, just a safety thesis
> Become Head of Policy, then Head of Public Benefit
> Spend the next few years explaining AI to governments
> Advise the OECD, the Global Partnership on AI, Stanford's AI Index
> Keep writing Import AI every single week regardless
> Newsletter grows from a niche read to 100,000+ subscribers
> End up one of the most-cited voices on AI policy on the planet (and probably a billionaire)

One of the most successful operators to ever come out of UK tech.

Absolute GOAT.

nice @jackclarkSF

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Synthesia continues to be one of the UK's and Europe's most successful AI companies.

NICE @vriparbelli

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A UK AI startup (that just came out of stealth with $10m of funding) has released a tool so you can connect and speak to all your AI agents in one place.

The startup came out of stealth a few weeks ago with $10m of funding as it was spun out of @Improbableio .

The team have built an AI-native messaging platform where individuals can automate business processes by describing them in plain text.

Today the company has announced a new tool enabling users to connect and communicate with all of their AI agents at once (be it Grokbot, Muse, Dots, etc).

This is a SUPER hot topic at the moment. Everyone is trying out all these different AI agentic tools, which are all of a sudden becoming really powerful.

HOWEVER the issue is that every agent lives in its own world, disconnected from other agents.

@HermanNarula and the @BolterApp team are trying to solve this.

VERY COOL

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The job search is insanely broken.

Instead of having to send an endless amount of applications or rely on pure luck, @MattJonWilson tells @Jackandjillai agents have now solved the problem.

They scan every job out there and match you with the right one, fulfilling every job seeker's dream.

1:38

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A UK startup has just raised a $100 million Series A to build quantum computers.

This is the largest Series A round for a UK quantum company ever.

The company, founded by Sebastian Weidt and Winfried Hensinger, was started on the belief that scale is the major challenge in quantum computing.

Universal Quantum's computers are designed and built by linking together, or tiling, many small, advanced quantum chips to deliver the overall high-quality qubit count required to solve problems classical computers cannot (without reliance on photonic interconnects or large lasers and cooling infrastructure).

Today the company announced a $100m Series A - marking the largest Series A ever raised by a quantum firm headquartered in the UK.

The round was co-led by DCVC and Firgun Ventures.

Quantum is still an area where there is yet to be a clear leader and therefore it's a real opportunity for the UK and Europe to compete globally.

NICE

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Same guy btw.

Gilbert Kosi@gilbert_kosi · Oct 8

Seb. A tree is priceless. The fuck are you talking about. And way more in fucking finland.

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my least favourite graph from @nathanbenaich's report.

"Four US hyperscales will spend $733bn in total capex in 2026. Europe commits 1bn"

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In the last week, ElevenLabs has:

> Launched in Singapore
> Launched in Belgium
> Launch in the Netherlands
> Topped the TTS leaderboard
> Ran a secondary to a $22 billion valuation.

DAMN

Mati Staniszewski@mati · Oct 8

ElevenLabs is officially launching in Singapore 🇸🇬

Our new Southeast Asia hub is open, and we're already working with businesses like Funding Societies and Atome.

I'm here all week. If you're interested in building with us, get in touch!

elevenlabs.io/blog/elevenlab…

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for all the anti-ai folks out there, the aim of this company (according to @demishassabis) is to cut the time it takes to develop new drugs from years to a matter of months.

There may be valid reasons to be concerned about AI, but there is so much good that can and will be done with AI.

This company is literally trying to cure diseases.

Seb Johnson@SebJohnsonUK · Oct 8

Isomorphic raising at a $40bn valuation, becoming the UKs most value AI startup.

Could go as high as $50bn

Demis is cooking.

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Isomorphic raising at a $40bn valuation, becoming the UKs most value AI startup.

Could go as high as $50bn

Demis is cooking.

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When we talk about the need to accelerate in Europe this is exactly what we're talking about.

Last month, Google committed to investing a WHOPPING $15bn into Finland to build AI infrastructure.

Now all work has been halted because of "Environmental concerns".

The concerns relate to the removal of about 300 hectares of forest.

This is a large area of land and equates to about 150k trees.

HOWEVER the project is expected to add more than 37,000 jobs and €3.6bn a year to Finland's economy.

At some point, we need to do the maths and decide what is more valuable:

4.5 trees or 1 job?

1 tree or €24k added to the economy?

AND the company is planning on growing 120 hectares of forest to compensate.

If you think 4.5 trees are more valuable to a society than one job, or that one tree is worth more than 24k, that is a fair position to take.

We should, however, be very honest and realistic about the trade-offs.

BBC News (World)@BBCWorld · Oct 6

Finland orders halt to work on two Google data centres bbc.in/3VwT5Uz

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A UK startup has just announced plans to build 40 edge data centres in the UK to power sovereign AI compute.

The UK has got some of the most phenomenal AI researchers and AI companies in the world.

One of the issues that we really have is a complete lack of compute both in the UK and across Europe.

@CivoCloud, the UK cloud provider, has announced plans to roll out 40 edge data centres in the UK to fix this.

The first site is in Hertfordshire and has already been announced. Five more sites have been secured, and will rise to 40 in total.

The sites will deliver a combined one gigawatt of capacity across the country, aimed at inference at the edge rather than training.

This fantastic news. The UK needs a lot more of this.

NICE @markboost

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