Rishi Sunak, who served as the United Kingdom’s prime minister from 2022 to 2024, has taken on senior advisory roles as Microsoft and Anthropic, The Guardian reports.
Letters from the Parliament’s office of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) disclosing Sunak’s appointments revealed concerns that the ex-Conservative PM’s privileged information could “grant Microsoft an unfair advantage.”
Sunak has some history with Microsoft, which has several active contracts with British government departments. In 2023, he unveiled a £2.5 billion deal with Microsoft to invest in new data centers and training in the U.K..
Acoba too noted that “there is a reasonable concern that your appointment could be seen to offer unfair access and influence within the U.K. government…given the ongoing debate about how to best regulate AI, and at a time of intense debate and lobbying around the world on what the approach should be.”
Sunak said he would steer clear on advising on U.K. policy matters, stick to high-level perspectives on macro-economic and geopolitical trends, and avoid lobbying. He said he would divert his salary to the Richmond Project, a charity he founded with his wife earlier this year.
The former PM also serves as a senior advisor to investment bank Goldman Sachs and speech writer for firms like Bain Capital and Makena Capital.
Sunak isn’t the first British politician to take on roles helping Silicon Valley tech giants navigate governmental affairs. Sunak’s senior political adviser, Liam Booth-Smith, is also on Anthropic’s payroll. And former Liberal Democrat Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg served as Meta’s president of global affairs until January 2025.
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In the United States, the revolving door between Silicon Valley and the U.S. government is ever-active. At Meta, Clegg was replaced by Joel Kaplan, George W. Bush’s former deputy chief of staff, as well as Dustin Carmack, a former adviser to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, joined the firm’s policy team in 2024. Microsoft’s current president of global affairs is Lisa Monaco, former deputy attorney general under Joe Biden.
