In the dash to reap the benefits promised from AI, countries, not just companies, are competing to maximise their AI readiness to attract top talent, investment, and build the best infrastructure to enable the emerging technology to maximise its full potential.

The global AI infrastructure market was valued at $36.59 billion in 2023, and is projected to grow to $356.14bn by 2032, at a rate of 29.1%.

Countries across the globe are ramping up their efforts to lay the foundation for AI innovation, but where are they now?

ARKANCE created a point-based index to score countries on their AI progress. The analysis is based on several key metrics, including AI venture capital investment, AI talent, research output, broadband speeds, cybersecurity, and government tech maturity over the last five years to identify the countries leading in AI infrastructure.

The analysis found that the UK ranks third in terms of overall AI infrastructure with a 6.93 out of ten. This is behind Singapore (8.91) and South Korea (7.71), which came out on top, but does mean that the UK leads Europe.

The UK has a strong AI venture capital investment of $7.5m per 1K GDP, 17% higher than South Korea.

But the UK really stood out with its high cybersecurity score of 9.95/10, which was only beat by the US with a score of 10.

With broadband speeds of 112 Mbps, outperforming Luxembourg by 30%, and a government tech maturity score of 8.4/10, the UK is poised for strong AI adoption and advancement.

With 18.8% of its research publications involving AI, the UK exceeds France (16.7%) in this area, underlining its dedication to advancing AI capabilities.

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While it came out on top in Europe, the UK was outperformed by Singapore and South Korea.

South Korea’s tech maturity, as well as its advanced AI-implementation capabilities, earned it a high score. Coupled with its broadband speeds of 160.6% and its strong cybersecurity index score (9.85), the country has a secure foundation of technological growth.

It was Singapore, however, which came out on top with a score of 8.91 in AI infrastructure. Singapore’s AI VC funding of $14m per 1k GDP far exceeds other countries, showcasing an environment primed for innovation.

It excels at AI talent, with ARKANCE measured by LinkedIn members, and leads in research with 31.8% of all research papers involving AI. The UK struggling in both these categories despite the range of top rate universities and broad talent pool.