Britain is good at starting businesses, but too many of its most promising companies leave when it's time to scale up. So what's stopping the UK economy from moving faster?

In episode one of The Fix with Ravi Gurumurthy, Nesta CEO Ravi Gurumurthy is joined by Peter Kyle MP, former Business Secretary and former Science and Technology Secretary, to unpack what the government needs to do to get the economy moving.

Drawing on his time in Cabinet, Peter argues the UK is on the motorway and heading in the right direction, but only travelling at 30 miles an hour. He warns that Britain is in a "growth emergency" that isn't widely recognised, and explains why growth has to become the organising principle of government, with every policy, tax and incentive judged against it.

The conversation also explores the barriers holding businesses back, from planning and energy prices to outdated regulation and the long wait over Heathrow. Peter explains why devolution on its own won't deliver growth, why Europe doesn't have a single trillion dollar company and what annoyed him about Jeremy Clarkson’s recent comments on entrepreneurship. He also sets out how Britain can make the most of AI, and the one simple change the Prime Minister could make tomorrow that wouldn't cost a penny.

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Find out more at https://www.nesta.org.uk/

Nesta is a UK research and innovation foundation. We design, test and scale solutions to the big challenges of our time. We're funded by a charity endowment and are politically neutral.
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The UK government is under immense pressure to respond to geopolitical instability, financial pressures and rapid technological change - but traditional policymaking methods are struggling to keep pace. AI has the potential to transform how government makes decisions, delivers public services and responds to a rapidly changing world - but what would a smart AI-enabled state actually look like? And is the government ready to adopt and embed AI?

With Andy Burnham now two-thirds of the way through his first 100 days in Downing Street, AI is a topic he has already had to face head-on. But might Burnham's new government use AI to build a smarter, more agile state?

To dive into this question, Nesta CEO Ravi Gurumurthy sat down with Professor Geoff Mulgan, former head of the Number 10 Strategy Unit, on our deep-dive series from the Policy Fix podcast: Andy Burnham's first 100 days.

Our duo discuss the areas where AI could transform policymaking, allowing civil servants to analyse evidence, test ideas and model scenarios at speed - and why avoiding AI-dependence while keeping human judgement intact is critical.

The conversation explores what an AI-enabled government could mean for Andy Burnham's approach to public control, how AI could make regulators smarter, whether public services could continuously learn and improve and what a more democratic alternative to centralised, authoritarian uses of AI might look like.

So, as Andy Burnham approaches the end of his first 100 days, what could he do to start modernising the state with AI? Listen to our latest episode to find out.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:41 Designing policymaking for the AI era
06:16 Will AI create overconfident generalists?
07:31 Using AI in the spending review
11:03 How AI could fix meetings
14:12 Leapfrogging Westminster
15:47 Can AI make state planning work?
19:57 Smarter regulators
21:56 A democratic alternative to authoritarian AI
23:41 Global governance of AI
27:34 Public services that continuously learn
32:38 How many civil servants should there be?
34:11 The one thing Burnham should do

Liked the episode? Rate, review, subscribe – and share it with your network.

Watch the full series on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfr-pIsrx5ko
Find out more about Nesta: https://www.nesta.org.uk

Nesta is a UK research and innovation foundation. We design, test and scale solutions to the big challenges of our time. We're funded by a charity endowment and are politically neutral.

Former Deputy National Security Adviser Jonathan Black joins Nesta CEO Ravi Gurumurthy to ask how Andy Burnham can make the UK economy more secure in a world where trade, technology, energy and investment have become tools of geopolitical competition.

This episode is part of Andy Burnham's first 100 days, our deep-dive series on the choices facing the new prime minister.

Ravi and Jonathan talk about how the UK should handle its economic relationships with the US, China and Europe, and where it needs to cut its reliance on countries and technologies that could leave it exposed. Jonathan draws on 25 years in government, including time as the prime minister's G7 and G20 sherpa. He goes through the hard trade-offs on offshore wind, AI and industrial policy, whether the UK should make a strategic bet on Europe, and what Whitehall needs to change to make these decisions well.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
01:56 Can a prime minister avoid foreign policy?
05:48 Global integration meets great power rivalry
08:03 Does US–China interdependence prevent conflict?
13:28 How economic security policy fails
19:36 The Mingyang offshore wind decision
25:40 AI and sovereign capability
28:46 Depending on US frontier models
32:08 Should the UK make a strategic bet on Europe?
35:24 Middle powers and coalitions of the willing
37:52 How Whitehall needs to change
43:08 Working with business without being captured
44:50 Burnham's diary and his first 100 days

Liked the episode? Rate, review, subscribe – and share it with your network.

Watch the full series on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfr-pIsrx5ko
Find out more about Nesta: https://www.nesta.org.uk

Nesta is a UK research and innovation foundation. We design, test and scale solutions to the big challenges of our time. We're funded by a charity endowment and are politically neutral.