I seriously seriously doubt the UK government has anything to do with Google's investment decision. But I do wonder why UK. Post Brexit every one was expecting Finance and Tech will all moved to Germany or the Netherland. This hasn't happened.
Despite all the noise most company have stayed where they are. And in many cases they even invested more in UK.
If you look into the job market a lot have moved to the Netherlands. The UK is gradually becoming irrelevant. A 1 bil $ investment is negligible in the grand scheme of things. If you spoke with people in finance then you’ll learn things are bad. Really bad.
The OP is right – at least according to Ernst and Young [1], who wrote in 2022 that:
> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)
> Since the referendum, 24 firms have publicly declared they will transfer just over £1.3trn of UK assets to the EU – a figure which has remained broadly flat over the past 18 months
> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016
> While many worst-case-scenario contingency plans have not been enacted, EY anticipates ongoing operational and staff moves from financial services firms across Europe as Brexit increasingly becomes part of a broader conversation about strategic business drivers and operating models
There has been no post-Brexit boom in financial services [2], with a variety of "business friendly deregulation" changes either "yet to be implemented" [as of Dec 2023] and with "none so far having a substantial impact".
> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016
it’s interesting that there was no mass relocation of jobs out of London:
> The OP is right – at least according to Ernst and Young [1], who wrote in 2022 that:
> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)
> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016
the number of people employed in UK FS is 2.2 million, so that's 0.3%
for comparison: last year 87,000 new UK jobs were added
structually most of these 2.2 million serve the UK domestic market and were never at risk of going to the EU
Please stop using France as a trashbin. We already bulldoze enough agricultural land every year and make life impossible for farmers (wtf are we doing with our own food producers in an age of ecology), if we want to remain sustainable, we should not stay as overpopulated as we already are and we should not overexploit our resources. What do you expect, “just build 56 more nucular reactors”?
There's a fairly large advanced hi-tech industry hub in the Netherlands. Philips and ASML are big names, but there are very many more. As they're all fairly near each other on the scale of things (often near Eindhoven, with more "non-physical" tech in Amsterdam), there's some Silicon Valley-style network effects at play.
Also French labour laws and norms are probably frightening to union-phobic Big Tech companies.
Plenty of things that used to be Philips are still in Eindhoven, like NXP (semiconductors) and Signify (lighting, including Hue). Philips has been a huge part of what made the Eindhoven area a high-tech industry hub, even if much of it is under new ownership structures.
It's not irrelevant to why Eindhoven is how it is today, in the same way that HP is a split-up shadow of what is former influential self, but it's partly why Google now is in Silicon Valley.
Just because it was relevant in the past doesn't mean it's also somehow relevant today if it stopped innovating, and it has. Glorious history doesn't pay your bills or increase your stock.
I am not the decision maker, unfortunately. The UK is on track to solving the cost of housing, by tanking the economy, but people still won't afford said housing since they won't afford the mortgages. Hope the NL finds a better way to solve its issues.
>Amsterdam is likely also the best connected area in Europe, the European equivalent of Ashburn, VA.
Best connected to what exactly? If you ask most people, Vienna is a lot better connected with the rest of europe. Amsterdam is at an edge of the continent.
Fair. I am US-centric, so I care most about trans-Atlantic access. From a peering standpoint we still do more traffic out of Amsterdam than Vienna by quite a far margin.
I'm umming and erring on this one — "irrelevant" feels much too strong (even NK isn't "irrelevant"), but OTOH "becoming" implies a direction of travel rather than a state, and every impression I have is that the UK doesn't matter as much as it used to.
We just invested £2.5b into Ukraine, all while following the lead of the US into Israel and Yemen and trying to make deportation deals with Rwanda. All while we watch the news on Japan and India building (rather than destroying) and landing rovers on the moon for the first time.
Remember when the UK looked down on India? Now it even relies heavily on hiring people from there.
Whoa. What’s so bad about “hiring people from there”? Now that east european skills have left it takes two to three locals to get the same job done, if they even figure out how. Have to bring people with expertise from somewhere. Only issue is that Indians are visa bound and underpaid, unlike east europeans that companies competed for and drove wages up - contrary to what the clay of the land thought.
You highlight a problem with talking about politics online. It seems very easy for people to become emotional with responses like "Whoa. What’s so bad about “hiring people from there”?" and assume a comment is racist rather than assuming the best intentions.
My intention was to highlight how the dynamics between other countries have changed and how the UK seems less independent and less interested in progress all while spending money on war (while aimlessly following the US).
I didn't expect tech to significantly leave London unless it became a lot harder to hire foreigners in the UK, and as far as I know it hasn't - non-EU immigration has increased hugely since Brexit. Unlike e.g. food or manufactured goods, software and related services don't have tight regulatory borders and the services are generally sold globally, not into discrete markets.
Finance is deflating like a slow puncture. There's fewer listings in London[1]. Open positions[2] is another early indicator. I believe the US is generally a bigger beneficiary than any EU competitor city. There is no emerging EU alternative to London, instead other cities are consolidating in specific verticals. It's a bit tricky to split out finance industry trends from the broader economy of course.
London's population is almost double all of Ireland. Dublin is not an alternative at all. The annual production of new STEM graduates in the UK is half the population of Dublin alone.
The alternatives to London are Paris (the closest competition as a city qua city), Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Dublin, and I believe they specialize differently.
When I buy EUR-denominated ETFs, they're almost invariably listed in Dublin with IE ISINs. Euronext stock exchange, the largest stock exchange in the EU, is in Amsterdam (domiciled - it's got multiple market places). For financial services, Frankfurt just overtook Paris[1] but they're pretty close.
>>non-EU immigration has increased hugely since Brexit.
Both things can be true at the same time.
If you run a British business it has become vastly more difficult to hire someone from the EU(where there is a lot of high skilled talent, especially in IT). Before Brexit if you found a candidate say in Spain, they could start working for you the next day, with the same paperwork as any British employee. Now if you wanted to hire the same candidate the hoops to go through to get them a visa are crazy and it takes minimum of 2-3 months to sort it out, not to mention the extra cost.
But since now the expense and effort for hiring EU candidates is roughly the same as hiring non-EU ones, is that really a surprise non-EU immigration has increased? Not to mention that EU candidates don't want to move to UK, and who could blame them - why accept a job on a 2 year visa that gives you and your family zero stability, when similarly paid jobs are available within the EU. And again - if you were going to bother with the whole visa nonsense why not go straight for US and get a much higher salary for the same job.
I seem to have noticed engineering teams I deal with having a bigger proportion of people from the Indian subcontinent now. Before Brexit there always seemed to be a couple of Polish, Hungarian, Spanish or Italian people in there, but they seem a lot rarer now for sure.
eh? because there are lots of customers there, including rich businesses who want to pay for cloud hosting in the UK legal jurisdiction with low latency.
Google already has datacentres in neighbouring countries - Ireland, Belgium, Netherlands, Finland, etc - and already has a cloud region in the UK so it's not very surprising to do some infill.
The problem with debating anything to do with Brexit is the promises that were made to win the vote were, by and large, total lies. There was an argument that we didn't have control of immigration because of the freedom of movement, a big part of that was an insistence that the immigration rate was unsustainable. Post brexit immigration has massively increased. So sure, the predictions about all the negative effects of clamping down on immigration were wrong. But that's because we didn't.
Similarly, the arguments about companies leaving the UK were based on the premise that UK regulation would diverge from EU regulation. But it hasn't.
In a few cases where real regulatory hurdles exist the UK has lost out. I worked for a company that started up an Amsterdam office directly because they needed to be within the EU, and that has genuinely drawn talent away from the UK to the EU. B
So far I think the biggest impact of Brexit has actually been state sector not private - suddenly the UK had to replicate the entirity of EU shared beauracracy. So now for example, we have to independently evaluate all drug approvals in what is basically a pointless waste of time replicating something the EU already did.
> Similarly, the arguments about companies leaving the UK were based on the premise that UK regulation would diverge from EU regulation. But it hasn't.
The Treasury forecast shortly before the referendum predicted a huge drop in investment, leading to a severe recession, starting as soon as there was a vote in favour of Brexit, before it even happened.
Also, there have been a shortage of good outcomes attributable to Brexit. Go through the headlines here, for example (although you the FT could be biased, I have no idea):
https://www.ft.com/brexit
In general headlines are not a place you find good outcomes. It's an unfortunate fact that bad news sells and there are a lot of different aspects one can focus on and measure.
Disclaimer: I have no idea on the net effects of Brexit.
One: London has an exceptionally high density of connectivity, with fast, low-latency connections across most of the western hemisphere. It's easy to recruit a lot of good technical staff at comparatively low cost. Power isn't particularly cheap, but it's relatively low-carbon and is moving quickly towards net-zero.
Two: The British government is desperate to cultivate the appearance of a thriving high-tech, high-growth economy and is willing to offer very generous terms for inbound investment. The current Prime Minister Rishi Sunak fancies himself as something of a tech bro and is eager to grow the British tech sector, even if that involves a lot of flexibility on things like tax and regulatory compliance. A large faction within the governing Conservative Party are keen to reposition the UK along the lines of Singapore or Hong Kong, acting as a low-tax, low-regulation bridge between larger international markets; there's a lot of movement in that direction that isn't particularly transparent.
Ireland used to be the benchmark in that respect, but it has become a more difficult environment due to persistent intervention by the EU and domestic discontent. Britain's post-brexit position as EU-adjacent imposes a lot of costs on SMEs, but it's attractive if you have the legal and lobbying resources to creatively navigate the ambiguity and uncertainty of that position.
Brexit or not, these things are sensitive to distance and infrastructure availability. There are certain hotspots, for example Egypt is one. Maybe the next one will be in Cairo, Istanbul or Sofia.
I feel like your post is a strawman. First, tons of especially finance jobs have left the UK. I don't think anyone ever thought "all" the jobs, or even a majority of them, would leave, especially when it's obvious huge banks can't just pack up overnight (or even in many years), but there is an undeniable deflation of finance activity. One reference: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/mar/29/brexit-fina...
And I never read anything that had people predicting tech would leave en mass. It generally seems like a mixed bag, with tech being relatively strong, but especially not reaping anywhere near the original promised benefits of Brexiteers: https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/02/01/brexit-3-years-on-t...
I really hope this comes combined with some serious thinking about the power grid. London is already constrained and we're literally talking about limiting planning permission for new houses because there's no capacity in the power grid for them. Just one more thing screwing our housing market.
Ah. But that is expecting action from a reigning government that has proven itself unable to do literally anything forward-thinking. It’s regression all over.
58 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 112 ms ] threadDespite all the noise most company have stayed where they are. And in many cases they even invested more in UK.
Maybe not the best idea to crowd the Eu's tech sector in an already crowded county. Why not a country with more free space, like France?
> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)
> Since the referendum, 24 firms have publicly declared they will transfer just over £1.3trn of UK assets to the EU – a figure which has remained broadly flat over the past 18 months
> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016
> While many worst-case-scenario contingency plans have not been enacted, EY anticipates ongoing operational and staff moves from financial services firms across Europe as Brexit increasingly becomes part of a broader conversation about strategic business drivers and operating models
There has been no post-Brexit boom in financial services [2], with a variety of "business friendly deregulation" changes either "yet to be implemented" [as of Dec 2023] and with "none so far having a substantial impact".
[1] https://www.ey.com/en_uk/news/2022/03/ey-financial-services-...
[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/post-brexit-big-bang-reform...
it’s interesting that there was no mass relocation of jobs out of London:
https://www.morganmckinley.com/uk/article/london-employment-...
https://www.statista.com/statistics/385366/uk-finance-insura...
> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)
> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016
the number of people employed in UK FS is 2.2 million, so that's 0.3%
for comparison: last year 87,000 new UK jobs were added
structually most of these 2.2 million serve the UK domestic market and were never at risk of going to the EU
If anything, we should decrease in population.
Also French labour laws and norms are probably frightening to union-phobic Big Tech companies.
I can't speak for everyone, but in my case it's laws, regulation, and general friendliness to business enterprises that bring income to the country.
Amsterdam is likely also the best connected area in Europe, the European equivalent of Ashburn, VA.
Best connected to what exactly? If you ask most people, Vienna is a lot better connected with the rest of europe. Amsterdam is at an edge of the continent.
Ireland is a satellite, not a hub. The bulk of traffic goes to UK landing stations, then to London.
https://www.standard.co.uk/business/city-jobs-boom-brexit-ex...
the simple fact is most of these jobs serve the domestic market and were never at risk
I don’t think this is supported by the facts, as much as Brexit was a dumb idea.
Remember when the UK looked down on India? Now it even relies heavily on hiring people from there.
My intention was to highlight how the dynamics between other countries have changed and how the UK seems less independent and less interested in progress all while spending money on war (while aimlessly following the US).
Finance is deflating like a slow puncture. There's fewer listings in London[1]. Open positions[2] is another early indicator. I believe the US is generally a bigger beneficiary than any EU competitor city. There is no emerging EU alternative to London, instead other cities are consolidating in specific verticals. It's a bit tricky to split out finance industry trends from the broader economy of course.
[1] https://www.standard.co.uk/business/peel-hunt-london-listing...
[2] https://www.efinancialcareers.ch/en/news/2024/01/brexit-bank...
that didn't stop you from trying though
"79% fewer job listings" is not the same thing as "79% fewer jobs"
yes, fewer people hiring at the moment because the cheap money has dried up
none of this is specific to the UK
i think that’s just a snapshot of the current economic situation around the world, not a long term trend:
https://www.morganmckinley.com/uk/article/london-employment-...
charts 15 and 16:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/64ad6d32fe36e...
this has a bunch if interesting stats:
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06...
When I buy EUR-denominated ETFs, they're almost invariably listed in Dublin with IE ISINs. Euronext stock exchange, the largest stock exchange in the EU, is in Amsterdam (domiciled - it's got multiple market places). For financial services, Frankfurt just overtook Paris[1] but they're pretty close.
[1] https://www.euronews.com/business/2023/10/21/europes-top-fin...
>>non-EU immigration has increased hugely since Brexit.
Both things can be true at the same time.
If you run a British business it has become vastly more difficult to hire someone from the EU(where there is a lot of high skilled talent, especially in IT). Before Brexit if you found a candidate say in Spain, they could start working for you the next day, with the same paperwork as any British employee. Now if you wanted to hire the same candidate the hoops to go through to get them a visa are crazy and it takes minimum of 2-3 months to sort it out, not to mention the extra cost.
But since now the expense and effort for hiring EU candidates is roughly the same as hiring non-EU ones, is that really a surprise non-EU immigration has increased? Not to mention that EU candidates don't want to move to UK, and who could blame them - why accept a job on a 2 year visa that gives you and your family zero stability, when similarly paid jobs are available within the EU. And again - if you were going to bother with the whole visa nonsense why not go straight for US and get a much higher salary for the same job.
Just my 2c as an immigrant to UK.
eh? because there are lots of customers there, including rich businesses who want to pay for cloud hosting in the UK legal jurisdiction with low latency.
Google already has datacentres in neighbouring countries - Ireland, Belgium, Netherlands, Finland, etc - and already has a cloud region in the UK so it's not very surprising to do some infill.
Similarly, the arguments about companies leaving the UK were based on the premise that UK regulation would diverge from EU regulation. But it hasn't.
In a few cases where real regulatory hurdles exist the UK has lost out. I worked for a company that started up an Amsterdam office directly because they needed to be within the EU, and that has genuinely drawn talent away from the UK to the EU. B
So far I think the biggest impact of Brexit has actually been state sector not private - suddenly the UK had to replicate the entirity of EU shared beauracracy. So now for example, we have to independently evaluate all drug approvals in what is basically a pointless waste of time replicating something the EU already did.
The Treasury forecast shortly before the referendum predicted a huge drop in investment, leading to a severe recession, starting as soon as there was a vote in favour of Brexit, before it even happened.
Disclaimer: I have no idea on the net effects of Brexit.
Two: The British government is desperate to cultivate the appearance of a thriving high-tech, high-growth economy and is willing to offer very generous terms for inbound investment. The current Prime Minister Rishi Sunak fancies himself as something of a tech bro and is eager to grow the British tech sector, even if that involves a lot of flexibility on things like tax and regulatory compliance. A large faction within the governing Conservative Party are keen to reposition the UK along the lines of Singapore or Hong Kong, acting as a low-tax, low-regulation bridge between larger international markets; there's a lot of movement in that direction that isn't particularly transparent.
Ireland used to be the benchmark in that respect, but it has become a more difficult environment due to persistent intervention by the EU and domestic discontent. Britain's post-brexit position as EU-adjacent imposes a lot of costs on SMEs, but it's attractive if you have the legal and lobbying resources to creatively navigate the ambiguity and uncertainty of that position.
Take a look: https://www.google.com/about/datacenters/locations/
Brexit or not, these things are sensitive to distance and infrastructure availability. There are certain hotspots, for example Egypt is one. Maybe the next one will be in Cairo, Istanbul or Sofia.
And I never read anything that had people predicting tech would leave en mass. It generally seems like a mixed bag, with tech being relatively strong, but especially not reaping anywhere near the original promised benefits of Brexiteers: https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/02/01/brexit-3-years-on-t...