Investors divert cash into British tech amid ongoing US-China trade war
US and Asian investors have more than doubled their investment into British tech start-ups in this first half of this year, as the stalemate between Washington and Beijing caused more cash to flow through to the UK.
Figures compiled by the Government's digital economy council and industry group Tech Nation found British tech companies attracted $6.7bn (£5.5bn) in foreign investment since the start of 2019.
More than half of that came from American and Asian investors, with major deals including the $800m investment into finance start-up Greensill by Japan's SoftBank and Deliveroo's $575m recent raise.
Overall, the UK tech sector has attracted more US and Asian investment in the first half month of 2019 ($3.5bn) than it did during the whole of last year ($2.9bn). US and Asian investment reached $1.1bn in the same period a year ago.
The report said the surge was "in part due to the rising number of high-value deals".
London-focused tech body Tech London Advocates in May warned that the political situation was "harming our fastest growing industry and making access to capital and talent harder than ever before".
However, Nicky Morgan, the new secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport, said the latest figures were a sign of the "confidence global investors continue to have in our growing sector".
The "growing interest from two of the world’s biggest and most important technology markets is one more reason we should be truly optimistic about our future," she said.
The increase in investment into British companies comes as US and Chinese investors face tougher restrictions over doing deals in each other's country
Last year, the US introduced new rules to allow it to have more scrutiny, and more powers, to block foreign investments into the country, seen as a direct effort to curb Chinese investment.
According to a report by Rhodium Group and the National Committee on US-China Relations, Chinese investors had abandoned deals worth more than $2.5bn in the US over the course of 2018 as a response to the rules.
US investors, meanwhile, have held off investing into China as the trade war between the two countries continues to drag on.
