Sustained growth, he showed, depends on science and technology evolving together, a high level of mechanical competence to make the most of them, and a society open to disruptive change.

The other winners also showed how innovation is the key driver of growth, through a process of “creative destruction” of established companies by new products and processes.

It is clear such innovation is the main and overwhelmingly important determinant of whether we live in a growing or a stagnating economy.

No wonder Rachel Reeves has promised to cut £6bn of “pointless” government red tape for business every year in an attempt to boost growth.  In a package of measures announced recently, plans to allow artificial intelligence firms to release products even if they do not comply with existing regulations were outlined.

The government has also instructed regulators that they have an overriding duty to prioritise economic growth in their decision-making.  Every regulator is set to be given targets to speed up the reduction of red tape, and performance league tables will be published.  Other plans to reduce red tape include proposals to set up AI “growth labs” that will allow developers to release products and services that, under existing regulations would potentially be judged illegal.

The technology secretary Liz Kendall said: “We need to overhaul the old approaches.  This isn’t about cutting corners – it’s about fast-tracking responsible innovations.”

It’s not the only initiative to encourage innovation that the government has launched.  Others include a new global talent fund to attract researchers, a “concierge” service to help finance firms locate in Britain, reform of pension schemes to promote investment in UK firms, longer-term 10-year budgets for research funding and a new health data research service.

This is all good stuff.  And I agree with John Foster, the chief policy officer at the CBI, the business lobby group, who said the government deserved credit for addressing the issue of red tape stifling AI innovation.  As a leader in the use of AI in originations, servicing, and payments, you might expect Target Group to want to be calling for the industry to “cast off the straitjacket of regulation”, too.

Well, not quite.

While I’ll concede there is an opportunity cost to regulation that might reduce the scope for innovation, our view is that when it comes to mortgages, lending and collections, it’s a nuanced topic.

We work in financial services which is a highly regulated environment – for very good reason.  There are risks with poorly trained AI delivering poor outcomes for customers.  We have already seen examples of bias being found in AI systems and I am concerned about the threat posed by discrimination with “small language models”.  By way of example, the government had to pull an AI system used to detect welfare fraud because it incorrectly selected people from some groups more than others when deciding whom to investigate.

So, rather than calling for fewer regulations, what we would like to see is regulation that is fleeter of foot and catches with technological advances faster – regulation that evolves quickly.  And having worked hard to get the industry to focus on the right customer outcomes, it would be regressive not to apply the same outcome-based thinking to AI.

I must warn the industry that such fast-paced regulatory change comes with its own problems.  It can be tricky to keep up.  Target certainly dedicates tremendous resources to keeping pace with it.

As the mortgage industry embraces an era of rapid technological change, we must recognise the need to balance the drive for growth with agile, responsible regulation.  We need to ensure innovations, particularly in sensitive sectors like financial services, are both dynamic and safe.  This approach will not only safeguard customer outcomes – but will honour the principles celebrated by this year’s Nobel prize.

Uday Bola is head of solution design at Target