Saudi Arabia has set up a new AI company that will be hosted by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and become the main tool in Riyadh to drive the kingdom’s strategy and investment as it attempts to become a global AI hub.
The day before U.S. President Donald Trump landed in Riyadh, a new multi-billion dollar entity called "Humain" the day before landing on Riyadh.
Tesla's Elon Musk, Openai's Sam Altman and Meta's Mark Zuckerberg are also expected to enter the Saudi capital on Tuesday to attend the U.S. Sudi Investment Forum, when a multi-billion-dollar deal will be announced in AI, defense and other departments and other departments.
According to a statement released by Saudi State News Agency, no details about the size of local capital are provided, but the company plans to build a suite of AI technologies and infrastructure, including data centers.
It will be both an investor and operator of AI assets and plans to provide advanced large-scale Arabic language models for users in Saudi Arabia and throughout the Middle East.
Building state-of-the-art AI models often involves hundreds of millions of dollars, involving cutting-edge chips, huge energy demands and other infrastructure costs.
U.S. technology companies are increasingly seeking the bay, which manages some of the world's largest and most active sovereign wealth funds to raise funds and attract investment.
Riyadh hopes that the launch of Humain, owned by a $940 billion public investment fund, will make its AI strategy clear.
Saudi officials have made numerous statements about the country’s grand ambitions in the industry in recent years, but it is not clear which entity is leading the program.
PIF has set up several AI companies, including Alat, also hosted by Prince Mohammed, which has pledged $10 billion to invest in AI hardware and technology infrastructure by 2030.
Last year, US AI Chipmaker Groq announced a partnership with Aramco Digital, a subsidiary of the Saudi Arabian National Oil Corporation, to build the world's largest inferred data center. Brain AI chip maker Cerebras has also announced an alliance with Aramco.
The U.S. Treasury Department said Thursday it would establish a "fast track process to promote greater investment in U.S. businesses by allies", with Gulf countries lobbying accelerating U.S. AI investment and easily gaining U.S. chips.
Gulf countries increasingly see AI as a key component in reducing dependence on oil and developing new industries.
Trump will establish the G42 in the United Arab Emirates, which will be visited this week, hosted by Sheikh Tahnoon Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, a national security adviser for the Gulf of Mexico, as its primary AI vehicle. Last year, Microsoft invested $1.5 billion in minority stakes in G42, a deal seen as key to U.S.-UAE relations.
Abu Dhabi also established a dedicated AI investment fund, MGX, last year and has taken a strategic decision to invest in U.S. technology.
Qatar, another country that Trump toured, has also clarified AI ambitions and is likely to announce investment in the industry during the presidential visit.
After a decade of crazy activity, Saudi Arabia's spending overseas has slowed in recent years as the government struggles to cope with the huge scale of its domestic projects, many of which are supervised by the PIF.
But AI is considered one of the areas the Kingdom hopes to continue spending. In January, Prince Mohammed promised that the Kingdom would invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years after calling Trump.
Other reports by MelissaHeikkilä