Was the UK Government's £4.1m PWC AI Skills Hub worth the money?

There has been a lot of LinkedIn noise about this AI Skills Hub box of weblinks website delivered to the UK Government by PWC for a cool £4.1m. A good post commenting on this below.

I had a look at the new site. It's not a very good website (it's not the worst) but there are so many questions here. How can we do better and spend our public money to get greater value is one obvious one, but the key question, for me, is this: where has our ambition and visionary drive gone?

1. The governments (all flavours) have talked for years about giving more contracts to smaller companies. This contract would have been a prime candidate. Perhaps any discreet piece of work like this, say under £5m, can only go to an SME supplier? I can't see any risk here that requires a global entity to underwrite the delivery. A smaller supplier will work all hours to make something remarkable, because this is their shot at getting a foot hold in the industry.

2. The ambition of the site is really depressing. AI is a transformational technology of the future. This website thinks like it's 2014. Why not have an interactive tutor who can build your skills plan through a conversation? What about creating a video series showing real people learning AI skills? What about a competition for the most innovative idea? How can you introduce influencers into the mix to help spread the word? How about showing how AI built the actual site in a diary journey?

3. All of the above could have been done by PWC to deliver beyond the expected scope. The PR could have been amazing. What a missed opportunity.

4. The budget is totally crazy. An MVP of this site with no authentication would probably take a skilled team with AI would take very little time. The V1 does not need authentication, add that later. It will take longer to build a production grade site with those features but that is the best way to build these days: deliver, iterate, deliver.

I will be interested in PWC's reaction to this story. They have an opportunity to swallow the cost and double down on a new version, one that has an extraordinary vision to support this country. I imagine there are people in AI roles in PWC jumping up and down at this with better ideas than mine. Let them at it."