(Bloomberg) — A day after his inauguration as U.S. president, Donald Trump unveiled a $100 billion plan to fund artificial intelligence infrastructure, backed by three of the biggest names in tech – OpenAI, SoftBank Group Corp. and Oracle Corp. a company based in Abu Dhabi that few people had heard of: MGX.
The Emirati investment vehicle is overseen by one of the world’s most influential dealmakers: Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE’s national security adviser, brother of the country’s president and the head of a $1.5 trillion empire spanning everything. wealth funds to the region’s largest AI company, G42.
Established in March, with Mubadala Investment Co. and G42 as founding partners and with a goal of eventually surpassing $100 billion in assets, MGX has become a key tool in the country’s fight for AI dominance. He plans to contribute about $7 billion to Trump’s plan, known as Stargate, the news reported.
Representatives for MGX declined to comment.
The company has backed OpenAI, while partnering with BlackRock Inc. and Microsoft Corp. on a $30 billion plan to build data warehouses and energy infrastructure. She invested money in Elon Musk’s xAI and was among the investors in Databricks Inc., one of the world’s most valuable private technology companies.
It combines the financial clout of Mubadala, itself a significant force in the $330 billion world of tech investing, with the AI arsenal of G42, a company that secured funding from Microsoft and signed agreements with Nvidia Corp. and OpenAI.
The fund has recruited from the ranks of Mubadala, according to posts on LinkedIn, and its CEO, Ahmed Yahia Al Idrissi, was previously responsible for the sovereign fund’s direct investments. MGX recently hired an executive from Swedish investment firm EQT AB’s sourcing tool, Motherbrain, as chief AI architect, and tapped a McKinsey & Co. veteran to research semiconductor contracts.
A city worth billions of dollars
The moves come as Abu Dhabi, which holds 6% of the world’s crude reserves, strives to diversify its economy away from oil. While investments in sectors such as healthcare and finance are key elements of this strategy, AI is increasingly taking center stage.
Certainly, the city’s ambitions have encountered obstacles.
Last year, a U.S. lawmaker urged the Commerce Department to consider trade restrictions on the G42 because of its ties to China. The Abu Dhabi company denied “any ties to the Chinese government and its military-industrial complex” and reached an agreement with the US government to end its cooperation with Beijing.
