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| Founded | 2015; 10 years ago (2015) |
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| Founder | UK Government |
| Type | Research institute |
| Registration no. | England and Wales: 09512457 |
| Focus | Data sciences |
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CEO | in recruitment |
| Website | www |
The Alan Turing Institute is the United Kingdom's national institute fordata science andartificial intelligence, founded in 2015 and largely funded by theUK Government. It is named afterAlan Turing, the British mathematician and computing pioneer.[1]
The Alan Turing Institute was founded following a letter from theCouncil for Science and Technology (CST) to theUK prime minister (7 June 2013), describing the "Age of Algorithms". The letter presented a case that "The Government, working with the universities and industry, should create a National Centre to promote advanced research and translational work in algorithms and the application of data science".
The Alan Turing Institute fits into a complex organisational landscape that includes theOpen Data Institute, theDigital Catapult and infrastructure investments. The role of the institute is to provide the expertise and fundamental research into data science and artificial intelligence needed to solve real-world problems.[2]
The Alan Turing Institute has since 2021 run an annual event called AI UK,[3] which is described as a national showcase of data science and artificial intelligence.
The organisation's intranet is called Mathison, which was Alan Turing's middle name.
In 2015,Lloyd's Register Foundation became the institute's first strategic partner, providing a grant of £10 million over five years to support research into the engineering applications ofbig data.[4][5][6]
In March 2023, the Turing Institute announced a new strategy, dubbed "Turing 2.0" where AI was to focus onhealth, the environment andnational security.[7] Following the release of the strategy, an all-male team of four senior academics was hired to deliver on the new strategy, leading to a letter signed by 180 staff members to express serious concerns about the institute's approach todiversity and inclusion.[8]
In October 2024, the Institute started a redundancy consultation process, affecting around 140 of the 440 staff members.[9]
In December 2024, 93 employees of the Alan Turing Institute sent a letter to the board of the institute to expresses no confidence in the body's executive leadership and asked the board to intervene.[10] In addition to concerns about gender diversity and the redundancy round, the letter mentions the institute's sense of direction as issues. Furthermore, it outlines how a lack of accountability and transparency, as well as poor decision making by the executive, are leading to a catastrophic decline in trust in leadership and rising levels of stress and burnout across employees. Reportedly, an internal review by the institute mirrors these conclusions.[11]
On 4 July 2025, it was reported that the technology secretaryPeter Kyle demanded a further overhaul of the Alan Turing Institute, calling for a focus on defence and national security, and a change of leadership.[12] In a letter to the chair of the Turing, Kyle reportedly wrote that "it remains clear that further action is needed to ensure the ATI meets its full potential".[13] Around that time, ATI was undergoing a restructuring with about 50 staff notified that they were at risk of redundancy. A letter in August 2025 from Kyle called for leadership change, as well as repeating his call for the change of focus. He warned long-term funding could be reviewed in 2026.[14]The Guardian and BBC reported that staff of the ATI "have raised concerns about the organisation's governance and internal culture" in a whistleblowing complaint to theCharity Commission, after staff also complained to the institute's main funder,UK Research and Innovation.[14][15] The BBC reported on the internal response to staff by Turing's ChairDoug Gurr and CEOJean Innes, claiming a commitment to "honesty, integrity and transparency" that was viewed by the whistleblowers as "performative".[16] On September 4, 2025, the institute announced that Innes will be stepping down as the CEO.[17][18] In an interview with the BBC, published on October 28, 2025, Gurr claimed that the whistleblower complaints had been "independently investigated", but did not name which third party had conducted that investigation.[19]
The Alan Turing Institute is an independent private-sector legal entity, operatingnot-for-profit and as a charity.[20] It is a joint venture among theUniversity of Cambridge, theUniversity of Edinburgh, theUniversity of Oxford,University College London (UCL) and theUniversity of Warwick, selected on the basis of internationalpeer review.[21] In 2018, the institute was joined by eight additional university partners:Queen Mary University of London,University of Leeds,University of Manchester,University of Newcastle,University of Southampton,University of Birmingham,University of Exeter andUniversity of Bristol.
TheEngineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the primary funder of the institute, is also a member of the joint venture. The primary responsibility for establishing the Alan Turing Institute has been assigned to the EPSRC, with continuing engagement in the shaping of the institute from theDepartment for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and theGovernment Office for Science.[22]
In 2024 there were 440 staff members,[9] and as of 2025, "over 400 researchers collaborate[d] at the Turing", without information how many were actually employed.[23]
As of 2025, Turing strategic partners includedAccenture (since 2017),[27] theDSO National Laboratories, theGates Foundation with research on "Trustworthy Digital Infrastructure" fornational digital identity systems, GCHQ Ministry of Defence with research on implications and risks of climate change to human and national security, Lloyd's Register Foundation on data-centric engineerin,NATS (UK's air traffic control provider),Office for National Statistics andRoche on "disease, patient, and outcome heterogeneity".[25]
Funding for the creation of the institute came from a £600m investment for the "Eight Great Technologies",[28] and specifically so-called "big data", signalled by the UK Government in 2013[29] and announced byGeorge Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the2014 budget.[30] The bulk of the investment in "big data" was directed to computational infrastructure. Of the remainder, £42m was allocated to the institute to cover the first five years of its operation.[30] The five founder universities each contributed £5m to the institute.[4] Further funding has come primarily through grants from Research Councils, university partners and from strategic and other partnerships.[2]
In June 2021, the EPSRC awarded the institute £10 million, on behalf ofUK Research and Innovation, for 2021/22.[31]
The government's2024 Spring Budget provided a further £100m, spread over five years, directed towards applyingdata science andartificial intelligence to healthcare, protecting the environment and bolstering national defence.[32] Soon after, a review by theEngineering and Physical Sciences Research Council recommended improvements in financial oversight of funding for the institute.[33]
Concurrently with the selection of founder universities, the EPSRC initiated a process to find a "location partner". The resulting selection of theBritish Library in London was announced by theChancellor of the Exchequer in December 2014 during the launch of theKnowledge Quarter, a partnership of organisations in and around theKing's Cross area of the capital.[34]
In February 2023, plans for a new building were approved by the local council.[35]As of 2023, the Alan Turing Institute was housed within the current British Library building, but it was anticipated it would occupy new premises in a development planned on land between theFrancis Crick Institute and library.[36]
51°31′46″N0°07′37″W / 51.52944°N 0.12694°W /51.52944; -0.12694
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