IT Essentials: Baiting the hook

Big Tech is chumming the talent pool. You need to change your bait

IT Essentials: Baiting the hook

Microsoft's entry means competition for London's AI talent has never been more fierce.

For years, Google's DeepMind has been the only name on London's AI scene. Smaller players, some showing real innovation, have come and gone; but of the tech giants, only Google has had a dedicated AI presence in the capital.

Microsoft brought that monopoly to an abrupt end this week when it announced the opening of a new London-based AI office, just weeks after it hired DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman as its new head of AI.

Several former DeepMind teammates who joined Suleyman at his new company, Inflection AI, have followed him to Microsoft, including Jordan Hoffman, another former DeepMind colleague who will run the new office.

So, that's adding insult to injury, but there's another aspect: the impact on AI talent.

Adding another Big Tech firm is going to put serious pressure on the London talent pool. That pool is deep, but like all pools it has a bottom.

So, what's the solution? Anyone who likes to fish can tell you: when you're competing in a limited area, you have to be the one with the best bait.

For ages, Google had the best bait. Part of that came from just being Google, which might as well be the founder of the modern office, but also the work it could promise and compensation packages it could swing around. Now, it has competition from a similarly sized company, and the bait is going to have to get much more enticing - there are already rumours of multi-million dollar pay packets for the highest performers.

Unfortunately for everyone else, the impact is going to resonate at all levels: Microsoft might as well be cannonballing right into the pool. The resulting wave is likely to leave more than a few companies high and dry as their AI specialists are lured away.

If they can't compete on pay, companies will need to look at other benefits, like flexible working and childcare packages, to build and keep loyalty. A bit of a shame for those insisting staff have to come back to the office, but we always knew it was a dud idea, anyway.

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