Harwell Campus based AI start-up, Oxford Dynamics, has been supporting the government with the UK’s much anticipated and recently released Strategic Defence Review (SDR). Commissioned by the Labour government in July 2024, the SDR considers the threats Britain faces, the capabilities needed to meet them, the state of UK armed forces and the resources needed.
The early phase of the review involved wide consultation with industry, think tanks, allies and partners. This resulted in the need to consolidate and analyse over 8,000 responses from more than 1,700 contributors, including the public. Oxford Dynamic’s breakthrough AI tool known as AVIS – A Very Intelligent System – augmented the human-led process, allowing the SDR team to focus on high-value tasks such as in-depth reading and discussion of submissions.
“As a start-up, to be selected by the Government to assist with such an important review is fantastic for us. It’s a great endorsement of the skill of the OD team and our breakthrough agentic AI technology”, said Co-Founder, Shefali Sharma.
Fellow Co-Founder Dr Eddie Jackson explained “the MOD and government states it wants to grow an innovative UK SME ecosystem to help protect the country against the new, evolving threat dynamic – and Oxford Dynamics is a great example of the government doing exactly this.”
The company’s AI software platform, known as AVIS, takes an AI agent-based approach to understanding data at scale. “In simple terms, you can think of AVIS as a collection of AI Agents that have access to a smart combination of a search algorithm like Google search. However, these types of technologies suffer from inherent challenges such as lack of explainability and trustworthiness – and that’s what we’ve solved with AVIS”, explained Jackson.
Sharma went on to explain that humans remain an important part of the decision-making process, “AVIS does not replace people – it simply does the ‘heavy lifting’, leaving analysts to focus on high value decision making.”
Oxford Dynamics worked with UK industry giant Palantir on the defence review. “Working alongside what most would consider a massive competitor to OD might seem crazy, but it quickly became clear that we complement each other. AVIS augments Palantir’s technology – and we’re looking forward to exploring how we might work together on other opportunities”, explained Sharma.
Last year Oxford Dynamics also secured a £1 million contract with the MOD to develop an intelligent robot. The advanced mobile AI robot can replace people as the first point of contact in a hazardous incident, such as a chemical or biological incident. Designed specifically for use but the Department for Environment, Food and
Rural Affairs, the robot will operate beyond an operator’s line of sight across a range of terrains. It is being tested at Harwell Campus to assess its performance on grass, concrete, gravel, steps and slopes.