The UK wants to do its ‘own thing’ on AI regulation, suggesting a divergence from U.S. and EU
Jaque Silva | Nurphoto | Getty Images
LONDON — The U.K. says it wants to do its “own thing” when it comes to regulating artificial intelligence, hinting at a possible divergence from approaches taken by its main Western peers.
“It’s really important that we as the U.K. do our own thing when it comes to regulation,” Feryal Clark, Britain’s minister for AI and digital government, told CNBC in an interview that aired Tuesday.
She added the government already has a “good relationship” with AI companies like OpenAI and Google DeepMind, which have voluntarily opened their models up to the government for safety testing purposes.
“It’s really important that we bake in that safety right at the beginning when models are being developed … and that’s why we’ll be working with the sector on any safety measures that come forward,” Clark added.
Her comments echoed remarks from Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday that Britain has “freedom now in relation to the regulation to do it in a way that we think is best for the U.K.” after Brexit.
“You’ve got different models around the world, you’ve got the EU approach and the U.S. approach – but we have the ability to choose the one that we think is in our best interest and we intend to do so,” Starmer said in response to a reporter’s question after announcing a 50-point plan to make the U.K. a global leader in AI.
Divergence from the U.S., EU
So far, Britain has refrained from introducing formal laws to regulate AI, instead deferring to individual regulatory bodies to enforce existing rules on businesses when it comes to the development and use of AI.
This is different from the EU, which has introduced comprehensive, pan-European legislation aimed at harmonizing rules for the technology across the bloc taking a risk-based approach to regulation.
The U.S., meanwhile, lacks any AI regulation whatsoever at a federal level and has instead adopted a patchwork of regulatory frameworks at the state and local level.
During Starmer’s election campaign last year, the Labour Party committed in its manifesto to introducing regulation focusing on so-called “frontier” AI models — referring to large language models like OpenAI’s GPT.
However, so far, the U.K. is yet to confirm details on proposed AI safety legislation, instead saying it will consult with the industry before proposing formal rules.
“We will be working with the sector to develop that and bring that forward in line with what we said in our manifesto,” Clark told CNBC.
Chris Mooney, partner and head of commercial at London-based law firm Marriott Harrison, told CNBC that the U.K. is taking a “wait and see” approach to AI regulation even as the EU is forging ahead with its AI Act.
“While the U.K. government says it has taken a ‘pro-innovation’ approach to AI regulation, our experience of working with clients is that they find the current position uncertain and, therefore, unsatisfactory,” Mooney told CNBC via email.
One area Starmer’s government has spoken up on reforming rules for AI has been around copyright.
Late last year, the U.K. opened a consultation reviewing the country’s copyright framework to assess possible exceptions to existing rules for AI developers using artists and media publishers’ works to train their models.
Businesses left uncertain
Sachin Dev Duggal, CEO of London-headquartered AI startup Builder.ai, told CNBC that, although the government’s AI action plan “shows ambition,” proceeding without clear rules is “borderline reckless.”
“We’ve already missed crucial regulatory windows twice — first with cloud computing and then with social media,” Duggal said. “We cannot afford to make the same mistake with AI, where the stakes are exponentially higher.”
“The U.K.’s data is our crown jewel; it should be leveraged to build sovereign AI capabilities and create British success stories, not simply fuel overseas algorithms that we can’t effectively regulate or control,” he added.
Details of Labour’s plans for AI legislation were initially expected to appear in King Charles III’s speech opening U.K. Parliament last year.
However, the government only committed to establishing “appropriate legislation” on the most powerful AI models.
“The U.K. government needs to provide clarity here,” John Buyers, international head of AI at law firm Osborne Clarke, told CNBC, adding he’s learned from sources that a consultation for formal AI safety laws is “waiting to be released.”
“By issuing consultations and plans on a piecemeal basis, the U.K. has missed the opportunity to provide a holistic view of where its AI economy is heading,” he said, adding that failure to disclose details of new AI safety laws would lead to investor uncertainty.
Still, some figures in the U.K. tech scene think that a more relaxed, flexible approach to regulating AI may be the right one.
“From recent discussions with the government, it is clear that considerable efforts are underway on AI safeguards,” Russ Shaw, founder of advocacy group Tech London Advocates, told CNBC.
He added that the U.K is well positioned to adopt a “third way” on AI safety and regulation — “sector-specific” regulations that rules to different industries like financial services and health care.
Jensen Huang, chief executive officer of Nvidia Corp., during the US-Saudi Investment Forum at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, US, on Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025.
Stefani Reynolds | Bloomberg | Getty Images
In the weeks leading up to Nvidia’s third-quarter earnings report, investors debated whether the markets were in an AI bubble, fretting over the massive sums being committed to building data centers and whether they could provide a long-term return on investment.
During Wednesday’s earnings call with analysts, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang began his comments by rejecting that premise.
“There’s been a lot of talk about an AI bubble,” Huang said. “From our vantage point we see something very different.”
In many respects, Huang’s remarks are to be expected. He’s leading the company at the heart of the artificial intelligence boom, and has built its market cap to $4.5 trillion because of soaring demand for Nvidia’s graphics processing units.
Huang’s smackdown of bubble talk matters because Nvidia counts every major cloud provider — Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Oracle — as a customer. Most of the major AI model developers, including OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI and Meta, are also big buyers of Nvidia GPUs.
Huang has deep visibility into the market, and on the call he offered a three-pronged argument for why we’re not in a bubble.
First, he said that areas like data processing, ad recommendations, search systems, and engineering, are turning to GPUs because they need the AI. That means older computing infrastructure based around the central processor will transition to new systems running on Nvidia’s chips.
Second, Huang said, AI isn’t just being integrated into current applications, but it will enable entirely new ones.
Finally, according to Huang, “agentic AI,” or applications that can run without significant input from the user, will be able to reason and plan, and will require even more computing power.
In making the case of Nvidia, Huang said it’s the only company that can address the three use cases.
“As you consider infrastructure investments, consider these three fundamental dynamics,” Huang said. “Each will contribute to infrastructure growth in the coming years.”
Reversing the slide
In its earnings release, Nvidia reported revenue and profit that sailed past estimates and issued better-than-expected guidance. Last month, Huang provided a $500 billion forecast for sales of the company’s AI chips over calendar 2025 and 2026.
The company said on Wednesday that its order backlog didn’t even include a few recent deals, like an agreement with Anthropic that was announced this week or the expansion of a deal with Saudi Arabia.
“The number will grow,” CFO Colette Kress said on the call, saying the company was on track to hit the forecast.
Prior to Wednesday’s results, Nvidia shares were down about 8% this month. Other stocks tied to the AI have gotten hit even harder, with CoreWeave plunging 44% in November, Oracle dropping 14% and Palantir falling 17%.
Some of the worry on Wall Street has been tied to the debt that certain companies have used to finance their infrastructure buildouts.
“Our customers’ financing is up to them,” Huang said.
Specific to Nvidia, investors have raised concerns in recent weeks about how much of the company’s sales were going to a small number of hyperscalers.
Last month, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Alphabet all lifted their forecasts for capital expenditures due to their AI buildouts, and now collectively expect to spend more than $380 billion this year.
Huang said that even without a new business model, Nvidia’s chips boost hyperscaler revenue, because they power recommendation systems for short videos, books, and ads.
People will soon start appreciating what’s happening underneath the surface of the AI boom, Huang said, versus “the simplistic view of what’s happening to capex and investment.”
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