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A report published Sunday by Chinese technology news outlet 36Kr outlined how Gulf sovereign wealth funds have driven an aggressive expansion into artificial intelligence with commitments totaling tens of billions of dollars across dedicated funds and direct stakes in infrastructure models and hardware. The Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia planned a roughly 40 billion dollar AI vehicle as early as 2024 while Abu Dhabi’s MGX closed a 49 billion dollar AI-specific fund and the Qatar Investment Authority partnered with Brookfield on a 20 billion dollar joint venture for AI infrastructure the report said. These moves reflect a coordinated regional bet on the sector with capital flowing from Riyadh to Abu Dhabi and Doha according to the 36Kr assessment.
Chinese companies have emerged as a key destination for this capital according to the 36Kr report with Middle Eastern investors appearing on the cap tables of Zhipu AI MiniMax Digua Robot and Qianxun Intelligence. Prosperity7 the fund affiliated with Saudi Aramco invested 2.13 billion yuan in Zhipu AI at an earlier stage and that stake has grown to an estimated 43 billion Hong Kong dollars in value based on the company’s recent market capitalization of 360.8 billion Hong Kong dollars the report calculated. The investment has delivered roughly 17 times the initial outlay in paper returns underscoring the high upside Gulf capital has captured in select Chinese AI plays.
Activity intensified in 2026 with single-ticket commitments climbing into the billions of dollars the 36Kr report found. Saudi-backed HUMAIN signed a 1.2 billion dollar strategic financing framework with the national infrastructure fund in January to expand AI and digital infrastructure before committing 3 billion dollars to Elon Musk’s xAI in February and announcing more than 15 billion dollars in project collaborations at the LEAP conference earlier this month. Abu Dhabi’s MGX meanwhile participated in xAI’s Series E invested as lead on a 30 billion dollar Anthropic round and backed subsequent large financings for OpenAI and additional Anthropic tranches the report detailed.
Global SWF data places total sovereign wealth fund assets at 15 trillion dollars at the end of 2025 with 66 billion dollars directed into artificial intelligence and digitalisation that year. Middle East funds accounted for 43 percent of all capital deployed by such investors globally during the period with the Public Investment Fund alone committing 36.2 billion dollars across deals a Gulf News report citing the same dataset showed. Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company led regional activity with 12.9 billion dollars in AI and digital investments followed by the Kuwait Investment Authority and Qatar Investment Authority according to the figures.
Bloomberg reporting has highlighted how this spending is reshaping fortunes inside the kingdom with the Al Moammar brothers amassing a combined 1.4 billion dollar fortune through their controlling stake in Al Moammar Information Systems. The company’s shares surged after it expanded a data center contract with HUMAIN to more than 2.34 billion dollars covering 250 megawatts of capacity seven times the firm’s 2025 revenue. Such infrastructure projects leverage the region’s cheap energy and available land to position Gulf states as competitive compute hubs Bloomberg noted.
HUMAIN itself has signaled ambitions to launch a venture capital fund and open offices in the United States France and Britain while reducing reliance on the Public Investment Fund as its dominant shareholder. The company aims to position Saudi Arabia as a neutral player in global AI development akin to a technological Switzerland a September Semafor interview with its chief executive indicated. This strategy aligns with broader national visions that seek to diversify economies beyond oil through technology leadership.
