More than 3,400 jobs and billions of pounds of private investment are set to flow into Lanarkshire after the UK government named the region as Scotland’s first AI Growth Zone, a flagship initiative under its Modern Industrial Strategy. The Lanarkshire AI Growth Zone, announced on 29 January, will be delivered by Scottish data centre operator DataVita at its Airdrie site, in partnership with AI cloud specialist CoreWeave. Prime minister Keir Starmer said the Lanarkshire project showed how AI investment could directly benefit working people. When complete, the Lanarkshire AI Growth Zone will be among the most advanced AI sites globally, with plans for more than 500MW of on-site power generation over the next four years. Lanarkshire joins four other AI Growth Zones announced over the past year – in Oxfordshire, North Wales, South Wales and the North East of England.