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I mean it still has the most tech jobs and the highest salaries in Europe. It's declining, but from a very high spot.

dougmwne 4y ago
It doesn’t take too many years of negative growth while every other major country is growing for the UK to end up in a vastly diminished position.
mytailorisrich 4y ago
The UK also managed to develop and produce a Covid vaccine in record time and all by themselves. They are the only ones in Europe (with Russia). Not too shabby.
- gambiting 4y ago
  Because they were already working on mRNA vaccines for years beforehand, as a pure coincidence - it's a fascinating story on its own. The lab behind it went from a massively underfunded operation that was making progress against all odds, to suddenly having billions thrown at it to speed up the introduction of their tech at industrial scale.
  - mytailorisrich 4y ago
    It's not pure coincidence. It means that they have top teams working on the cutting edge and being pretty good at it, and that they have domestic pharma companies able to mass produce those advances quickly, which also means that they are at the cutting edge. And of course it means that, for once at least, the government acted strategically, decisively, and quickly (the government directly intervened so that production would go to a British company, for instance). France did not produce any vaccines. Germany produced one but effectively sold it to the US (Pfizer). Just to point that the UK is not to be written off just yet.
  - andyjohnson0 4y ago
    > Because they were already working on mRNA vaccines for years beforehand The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine uses a viral vector, not mRNA. The Pfizer–BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which do use mRNA, were developed in Germany and the US respectively.
- substation13 4y ago
  This would have also been possible within the EU. Brexit is not all bad, but research and higher education are industries made much weaker by it.
- nicoburns 4y ago
  They did, and I think it's fair to say that academic research is an area where the UK is still genuinely world leading (along with a few other countries). But this is also an area where Brexit has had a very direct affect: both because it limits the movement of academics who may no longer find the UK an attractive place to move and work, and because it cuts the UK off from EU funding. So it'll be interesting to see if this remains the case in 10 years time.
  - mytailorisrich 4y ago
    It does not limit the movement of academics. This is up to the government and they can make it as easy and simple as they want. Likewise for funding, ultimately it is largely a decision for the government. At the moment the issue really is optics, which is bad, and uncertainty. As you say it will be a number of years for the dust to settle.
    - nicoburns 4y ago
      > It does not limit the movement of academics. This is up to the government and they can make it as easy and simple as they want. Well I guess that's technically true. But in practice they're not making it easy! The issue isn't just optics. It's that it's much harder to get a visa than it used to be, the process has become a lot more expensive, and that there are much fewer guarantees that someone obtaining a visa will be able to continue to remain in the UK. It's a big decision to move your life to a new country, and it's hard to justify it if the government can eject you again at short notice on their whim.
- Xenoamorphous 4y ago
  Wasn't Pfizer's vaccine the first one, and wasn't it developed by the german Biontech? Or is it the "by themselves" what makes this one not count (due to Pfizer involvement or whatever?).
kmlx 4y ago
is tech really declining in the UK?
- pornel 4y ago
  I only have anecdata, but I've seen people move to Berlin and Dublin, and startup incubators open branches elsewhere after the Brexit vote. Personally I'm worried about UK actively dismantling privacy laws, which will make it even harder for UK-based companies to serve the EU market.
  - kmlx 4y ago
    yeah, doesn't seem so: https://dealroom.co/blog/uk-tech-health-check-london-tech-week-2022 https://dealroom.co/blog/uk-tech-health-check-london-tech-we... it actually looks like it's growing.

It doesn’t take too many years of negative growth while every other major country is growing for the UK to end up in a vastly diminished position.

mytailorisrich 4y ago

The UK also managed to develop and produce a Covid vaccine in record time and all by themselves. They are the only ones in Europe (with Russia). Not too shabby.

gambiting 4y ago
Because they were already working on mRNA vaccines for years beforehand, as a pure coincidence - it's a fascinating story on its own. The lab behind it went from a massively underfunded operation that was making progress against all odds, to suddenly having billions thrown at it to speed up the introduction of their tech at industrial scale.
- mytailorisrich 4y ago
  It's not pure coincidence. It means that they have top teams working on the cutting edge and being pretty good at it, and that they have domestic pharma companies able to mass produce those advances quickly, which also means that they are at the cutting edge. And of course it means that, for once at least, the government acted strategically, decisively, and quickly (the government directly intervened so that production would go to a British company, for instance). France did not produce any vaccines. Germany produced one but effectively sold it to the US (Pfizer). Just to point that the UK is not to be written off just yet.
- andyjohnson0 4y ago
  > Because they were already working on mRNA vaccines for years beforehand The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine uses a viral vector, not mRNA. The Pfizer–BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which do use mRNA, were developed in Germany and the US respectively.
substation13 4y ago
This would have also been possible within the EU. Brexit is not all bad, but research and higher education are industries made much weaker by it.
nicoburns 4y ago
They did, and I think it's fair to say that academic research is an area where the UK is still genuinely world leading (along with a few other countries). But this is also an area where Brexit has had a very direct affect: both because it limits the movement of academics who may no longer find the UK an attractive place to move and work, and because it cuts the UK off from EU funding. So it'll be interesting to see if this remains the case in 10 years time.
- mytailorisrich 4y ago
  It does not limit the movement of academics. This is up to the government and they can make it as easy and simple as they want. Likewise for funding, ultimately it is largely a decision for the government. At the moment the issue really is optics, which is bad, and uncertainty. As you say it will be a number of years for the dust to settle.
  - nicoburns 4y ago
    > It does not limit the movement of academics. This is up to the government and they can make it as easy and simple as they want. Well I guess that's technically true. But in practice they're not making it easy! The issue isn't just optics. It's that it's much harder to get a visa than it used to be, the process has become a lot more expensive, and that there are much fewer guarantees that someone obtaining a visa will be able to continue to remain in the UK. It's a big decision to move your life to a new country, and it's hard to justify it if the government can eject you again at short notice on their whim.
Xenoamorphous 4y ago
Wasn't Pfizer's vaccine the first one, and wasn't it developed by the german Biontech? Or is it the "by themselves" what makes this one not count (due to Pfizer involvement or whatever?).

kmlx 4y ago

is tech really declining in the UK?

pornel 4y ago
I only have anecdata, but I've seen people move to Berlin and Dublin, and startup incubators open branches elsewhere after the Brexit vote. Personally I'm worried about UK actively dismantling privacy laws, which will make it even harder for UK-based companies to serve the EU market.
- kmlx 4y ago
  yeah, doesn't seem so: https://dealroom.co/blog/uk-tech-health-check-london-tech-week-2022 https://dealroom.co/blog/uk-tech-health-check-london-tech-we... it actually looks like it's growing.