A high-profile breakfast at the imperial court in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, was one of the highlights of US President Donald Trump‘s subsequent journey to the Middle East. The Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Trump‘s host list caught the attention of the eye. Elon Musk, the head of Tesla’s secret service, was one of the biggest names in global artificial intelligence ( AI ): Jensen Huang, Sam Altman of ChatGPT parent OpenAI, Ruth Porat, Google’s president, and Andy Jassy, the company’s CEO. When many US tech companies made a number of deals with Saudi Arabia regarding AI money worth tens of billions of dollars during the Trump visit, their collective appearance soon made feeling. One of the most impressive is the agreement between Nvidia and Humain, a brand-new state-backed Saudi AI walk unveiled the day before Trump, to buy hundreds of thousands of high-end cards. In addition, Qualcomm and Advanced Micro Devices, the chip artist, made significant agreements.
China eagles are on the lookout for them.
It comes as Saudi Arabia increases funding in artificial knowledge and as the Trump administration tries to cement its position as the world’s top producer of high-end electronics and machine learning. According to Riyadh’s ability to establish and manage data centres, Karen E. Young, a Middle East specialist at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy in New York, thinks the US and Saudi Arabia are healthy colleagues in the field of artificial intelligence. They” can deploy quickly and efficiently and are able to deploy an enormous electricity supply from gas and solar power.” They do not hesitate to raise concerns about regulations or citing data centers or power plants. They are in a position where they gain,” she told DW. However, the Trump administration has been critical of the deal spree, including from within the organization. In the end, China could benefit from providing high-end chips to Middle Eastern nations, according to the critics ‘ claim. China has strong political and commercial ties to the Middle East, and some people think that chips sold by the US to the region might end up being shipped to China. The Trump administration revoked the laws introduced by former US President Joe Biden toward the end of his administration in 2024 that made it illegal for them to be sold to specific nations, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates ( UAE ). This so-called AI Diffusion Rule was criticized by companies like Microsoft and Nvidia, who claimed it stifled innovation. However, the fact that the US House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party has passed new legislation to prevent “proven US AI chips from falling into the hands of adversaries like the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)” is a reflection of the widespread concern over potential Chinese access. He told DW that there is a chance that China could either divert the chips themselves or gain access to them remotely. In a post on messaging platform X, David Sacks, president of Trump’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology and the self-declared White House AI czar, vehemently refuted claims that the Gulf deals might benefit China. The alternative was to “exclude critical geo-strategic, resource-rich friends and allies from our AI ecosystem,” he wrote, adding that “every nation will want to take part in the AI revolution. If we align with them, we will place them in our orbit. If we don’t like them, we will force them into China’s hands.
Gulf nations take their AI issues seriously
Whatever the case may be with China, it is obvious that Saudi Arabia and the UAE want to reduce their economic reliance on oil seriously. According to Karen E. Young,” Saudi Arabia is very serious about AI as a strategic sector for diversification.” She says the UAE is “likely more advanced” than Saudi Arabia in terms of AI development because it benefits from having a plentiful supply of energy, which gives the kingdom a bridge to future energy demand. The US and UAE agreed to construct the largest AI campus outside of the US in another agreement made during Trump’s Gulf tour, giving the UAE access to US-made advanced chips. With Microsoft having already invested more than$ 1.5 billion ( 1.34 billion ) in the UAE, G42 has been established as its main AI hub. Given their own enthusiasm for development and their control of some of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, the Gulf states are increasingly becoming an attractive opportunity for US companies looking to invest. The county’s Public Investment Fund ( PIF), which has about$ 1 trillion under its belt, owns all of Humani, the new Saudi vehicle. Saudi Aramco, a state oil company, has partnered with US chipmakers Cerebras and Groq, in addition to the PIF’s previous AI ventures. These locations lack only talent and computing, according to Martin Chorzempa, who said” these places have two of the most crucial ingredients to become major AI powers.” However, the talent may flock there with enough power, capital, and it appears that Saudi Arabia has a “national priority,” according to Karen E. Young, and Trump’s willingness to engage as a” transactional issue rather than a security issue or policy challenge” supports that goal. However, experts believe it is not always going to be “win-win” because the Gulf states are currently seen as vital AI hubs of the future despite the flurry of investment. He also makes note of the possibility that China will not necessarily gain from the chips itself but rather from sending its citizens there to work and study. One of the most intriguing inquiries is whether Chinese AI talent, which is top-notch and may not be able to immigrate to the United States, can gain access to the key ingredient they lack, chips, by working in the Middle East, he said. This will be a pressing issue for the US.
