I’m on a mission to bring Californian tech culture to the UK
When Sean Kohli left the UK for Silicon Valley, he found himself joining a hacker house, launching an AI start-up and eventually founding a venture fund. To rejuvenate the UK’s tech scene, he believes we need a bit of Californian magic here
The news that Paris has overtaken London as Europe’s leading hub for fintech investment must serve as a wake-up call and a warning of complacency.
In 1963, the United States and the Soviet Union were in the grips of the Space Race. A soon-to-be Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, returned from a visit to the US inspired by its capacity to align government, industry and cutting-edge research behind a shared objective. He pledged to build a new Britain “forged in the white heat of this [technological and scientific] revolution”.
Sadly, Wilson never really matched rhetoric with action. Seven decades on, Britain again finds itself at a crossroads: caught in a global race to master AI and other technologies, but watching others pull ahead. Today, Nick Clegg is the new figurehead for change, calling for a revival of Europe’s tech sector. But unless that revival starts with Britain, we risk being left behind not just by Silicon Valley, but by our own neighbours too.
I want to bring California to the UK
Brought up here in the UK, after finishing school I went to California to study English as a major, but I quickly became immersed in the entrepreneurial ecosystem that surrounds Stanford and Silicon Valley. I joined a hacker house, launched an AI start-up and later founded a venture fund. These opportunities simply wouldn’t have existed had I stayed in Britain.
British talent is world-class, but when it comes to the ecosystem and opportunities to bring ideas to life, both we and our European neighbours are falling behind. It’s my ambition to change that. I want to replicate the experience I’ve had in the US here in the UK.
In the UK, we often talk about ideas. In California, they get built, funded and scaled. Risk is rewarded. Regulation steps back. And a dense network of incubators, accelerators and investors drives founders forward.
The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor’s annual index of entrepreneurial environment highlights the UK’s faltering entrepreneurial ecosystem. We have fallen in the rankings each year since 2020 with concerns over education and access to funding for entrepreneurs.
There is also a deeper structural problem. Between 2020 and 2022, just 36 per cent of UK firms were innovation-active, down from 45 per cent in the previous cycle. Our share of global manufacturing exports has halved since 2000 – from 3.7 per cent to just 1.5 per cent. Even in life sciences, once a British strength, we’re missing out on £15bn a year due to falling inward investment and a drop in clinical trials.
Softer, cultural barriers to entrepreneurship mirror these hard numbers. One of the most damaging is the myth that starting a business requires tens of thousands of pounds. The true average is closer to £5,000. The reality is already hard enough; misperception makes it worse.
That’s why I have helped launch the Young Entrepreneurs Forum. It’s not just about helping founders survive the system. It’s about rewriting the rules. If we’re building the future, we should help shape the conditions that govern it.
This moment demands urgency. McKinsey estimates generative AI could add $4.4 trillion to global GDP. This isn’t hype, but more a paradigm shift. The countries that get this right will reap decades of growth. The rest will play catch-up.
A to-do list for the UK
Labour’s rhetoric so far has echoed Wilson. Keir Starmer promised to embrace the “white heat of a new technological revolution.” But unless that translates quickly into real policy, it risks going the same way: warm words, no structural reform.
Start with tax. The UK is already one of the least competitive OECD countries. Now some investors fear further tax hikes. That would put Britain at the top of global tax tables for all the wrong reasons. If you want innovation, you must reward risk, not penalise it.
Then there’s funding. Investment should be fast. Above all, founders should have real access to capital, especially at the early stage.
What also struck me about the US was how universities encouraged entrepreneurship. Students could pause their studies to launch start-ups, with clear routes to return. The UK should follow suit and turn its world-class institutions into launchpads.
Lastly, perhaps most crucially, we need a cultural rewire. In Britain, failure is often treated as a personal flaw. In the US, it’s a badge of resilience. We must embrace experimentation, iteration and risk. Realism never built a unicorn or a neural net.
The white heat Wilson spoke of wasn’t metaphorical. It was about shaking off the straitjacket of regulation and a mindset stuck in the past. That’s still our challenge today. Unless we act now, we won’t be the Britain we aspire to be, we’ll be a footnote in a race led by the US and China.
We have the talent. But talent needs traction. That means fixing tax. Fixing finance. Fixing regulation. And above all, backing the next generation of British founders to build.
Let’s not just talk about the next technological revolution. Let’s play our part.
Sean Kohli is a venture capitalist and chairman of the Young Entrepreneurs Forum