‘We’ve got some fabulous conditions’: Salesforce UK chief exec Zahra Bahrololoumi touts the country’s tech industry potential
Salesforce’s UK chief executive Zahra Bahrololoumi believes the UK tech industry has huge potential and emphasized the CRM giant’s commitment to the market.
Speaking at the Agentforce World Tour conference in London, Bahrololoumi told ITPro the UK has a variety of key advantages – particularly compared to European counterparts.
Looking back, she noted, the volume of investment in AI-related startups just two years ago was a “very strong indicator” of the state of the industry.
“If you look at the UK number it’s probably larger than a couple of our neighbours in mainland Europe put together,” she said.
The potential of the UK’s tech sector isn’t just measured by investment figures, however. Bahrololoumi also highlighted the country’s deep talent pools as a key differentiator alongside the collaborative nature of the national tech ecosystem.
“You also look at the density of talent, you look at the profile of leadership, you look at the quality of the organizations that we have and the customers, the nature of the businesses we have in the UK – plus progressive educational institutions,” she explained.
“I think the thing that makes us quite unique is the level of collaboration that actually exists across all of those stakeholders. None of us are going to win alone. Everything we talked about, whether it’s skills, whether it’s regulation, whether it’s policy, all comes from the interconnectedness of all of the key stakeholders – government, education, business, communities, people.
“So I think we’ve got some fabulous conditions within the UK.”
It’s these conditions that make the UK a “priority market” for Salesforce, Bahrololoumi added, and the company has made no secret of its continued focus on its activities across the country.
Last year, the firm announced a new AI Centre focused on research and development and community engagement. The London-based center marked the first of its kind for the CRM giant, which at the time said represented a huge “vote of confidence” in the UK.
Salesforce doubled down on this commitment at the World Tour event today, with Bahrololoumi announcing a new collaboration with Brunel University during the opening keynote session.
The partnership will see closer ties developed between the Salesforce UK AI Centre and Brunel’s own Centre for Artificial Intelligence. This again will focus on research and development in AI, as well as education in the form of workshops, community engagement, and conferences.
All praise for UK tech
Bahrololoumi’s comments come hot on the heels of Jensen Huang’s praise for the UK tech sector this week.
During a discussion with prime minister Keir Starmer at London Tech Week, Huang suggested that the UK is in a “Goldilocks circumstance” on account of its burgeoning AI sector and sizable investment.
The UK ranks third on AI investment globally, sitting behind the United States and China.
While Huang may have high hopes for the sector, there were lingering concerns voiced at London Tech Week – most notably around the UK’s infrastructure.
The Nvidia chief exec described the UK as the “largest AI ecosystem in the world without its own infrastructure”, and compared the challenge for the sector as akin to astronomers trying to work without modern telescopes.
“You can’t do machine learning without a machine – and so the ability to build these AI supercomputers here in the UK will naturally attract more startups, it will naturally enable all the rich ecosystem of researchers here to do their life’s work,” he explained.
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