OpenAI confirmed on 13 April 2026 that it was moving to its first permanent London office, with capacity to more than double local headcount1. The move landed days before the UK Sovereign AI Fund named Cosine and five other domestic firms as its first investees, a portfolio explicitly framed around reducing British dependence on frontier US AI models.
DSIT is writing equity cheques and allocating Isambard-AI GPU hours to firms whose pitch decks cite independence from American frontier models. The Home Office and Treasury are clearing same-day visas and real estate approvals that help OpenAI scale from its King's Cross base. Both tracks recruit from the same global AI talent pool, and neither department has publicly addressed the contradiction.
Cosine's positioning, that Britain should be building its own AI rather than renting it, sits awkwardly alongside OpenAI's London expansion on any reading. The UK version of that choice is currently to welcome both and bet that domestic talent density will rise faster than OpenAI can hire it away.
