Sovereign wealth funds, particularly in the Middle East, view AI as a 30-50 year societal transformation, not just a short-term investment. Their deep pockets and long-term strategic commitment mean they would likely step in to buy key chip stocks like NVIDIA at a discount during a market correction, effectively creating a floor under the market.

Humane partners with US AI startups like Grok by deploying their hardware in Saudi data centers. This gives the startup immediate global reach, while the startup's cloud entity manages the service to ensure U.S. compliance. This creates a win-win for revenue share and global distribution.

While data residency is a concern, political resistance and energy shortages may slow data center construction in the US and Europe. This could force Western AI companies to utilize the massive, rapidly-built capacity in places like the UAE, making the region a critical AI infrastructure hub.

Beyond the US and China, Saudi Arabia is positioned to become the third-largest AI infrastructure country. The national strategy leverages its abundance of land and power not just for oil exports, but to lead the world in "energy exports via tokens," effectively selling compute power globally.

Humane was founded after its CEO discovered it took oil giant Aramco nine months just to procure and deploy AI infrastructure. This massive delay, even for a well-resourced company, highlighted the foundational opportunity to build a national AI champion and regional digital hub for the Middle East.

Unlike US industrial CEOs, who are often finance-focused and risk-averse, leaders in the UAE and Saudi Arabia see technological transformation as vital for national survival. This existential pressure drives them to make bigger, bolder bets on AI and robotics to future-proof their economies.

The UAE aims to become a third AI power by serving the 4 billion people between Milan and Singapore. Its strategy hinges on acting as a "trustworthy third party," leveraging strong corporate data protection laws—akin to diplomatic immunity—to build trust and attract global partners like OpenAI.

The U.S. faces significant challenges in permitting and energy infrastructure for large-scale AI data centers. Gulf states like the UAE offer regulatory arbitrage, vast energy resources, and the ability to build at "Chinese rates," making them critical partners for deploying the American AI stack quickly.

Middle Eastern countries are making massive sovereign AI investments to diversify their economies. They are leveraging their core advantage—cheap energy—to power massive compute infrastructure, aiming to shift from an economy based on exporting hydrocarbons to one based on exporting intelligence and tokens.