Matt Clifford, who drafted the UK government's AI action plan and advised both Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his predecessor Rishi Sunak, has joined Anthropic as managing director of international affairs1,2.
In the role, Clifford will lead Anthropic's relations with governments outside the United States, covering Europe, Asia-Pacific, and India. The appointment comes roughly a year after Clifford stepped down from his Downing Street position as AI opportunities adviser, an unpaid role he held for approximately six months before resigning for personal reasons.
Clifford will retain two existing positions: chair of ARIA (the Advanced Research and Invention Agency), a UK government-backed body, and chair of Entrepreneurs First, a tech venture capital firm he co-founded.
The hire adds a figure with direct access to senior UK policymakers to Anthropic's government-relations operation at a consequential moment. Anthropic inked a $35 billion infrastructure deal with Lambda Inc. around September 1 and released Claude Fable 5.1 and Claude Mythos 5.1 the same day ctx. The company is also reportedly preparing for a stock market debut that could value it at $2 trillion.
The move has drawn criticism from governance advocates. Tom Brake, CEO of Unlock Democracy, a not-for-profit campaign group, said the transition highlights that "the revolving door is a problem for advisers as much as it is for ministers". Brake raised concerns about sensitive knowledge gained within government being carried into a private-sector role.
ANALYSIS Clifford's appointment gives Anthropic a senior figure who shaped UK AI policy from inside Downing Street, now tasked with managing the company's relationships with the same governments he recently advised. The dual retention of his ARIA chairmanship and the Anthropic role places him simultaneously inside a government-backed research body and a leading commercial AI lab.
For Anthropic, the hire extends its international policy footprint at a time when the company's commercial and capital-markets ambitions are scaling rapidly, with a potential $2 trillion IPO valuation and a freshly signed $35 billion infrastructure commitment both on the table.