Saudi Arabia Partners with xAI on Major Data Centre as Kingdom Expands AI Strategy

Elon MuskDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →’s artificial-intelligence company xAIDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has agreed to develop a 500-megawatt data centre in Saudi Arabia in partnership with Humain, the state-backed AI firm established earlier this year by Crown Prince Mohammed bin SalmanDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →. The project will be xAI’s largest data centre outside the United States and forms part of a broader effort by Saudi Arabia to position itself as a global hub for AI infrastructure and services.

The partnership was announced in Washington during a visit by the crown prince, alongside a wider set of US–Saudi military and technology agreements. The deal involves expanding access to xAI’s Grok models in the kingdom and is aligned with Humain’s aim to supply low-cost, large-scale computing power using the country’s energy reserves, land availability and connectivity. Humain has stated that it wants to support up to six percent of global AI workloads in the coming years.

For Saudi Arabia, the venture is another step in its plan to diversify the economy away from oil and deepen its footprint in advanced technologies. For xAI, it strengthens ties with a government that previously supported Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and provides access to significant capital at a time when AI companies are racing for compute capacity. Musk described the collaboration as a way to accelerate the development of “massive and efficient compute” needed for next-generation AI systems.

The agreement had been under discussion for several months but was slowed by uncertainty over Saudi Arabia’s access to advanced US semiconductors. The United States has used AI chip approvals as part of its diplomatic strategy, concerned in particular about the kingdom’s technology links with China. Officials now appear prepared to allow Nvidia and other suppliers to ship chips to Humain, clearing the way for the project to proceed.

The expanding presence of major US AI developers in the Gulf reflects the region’s willingness to finance and host large-scale computing projects. OpenAI has partnered with the United Arab Emirates’ MGXDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → on a data centre near Abu Dhabi, while AnthropicDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has secured investment from Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund. Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, has attracted business from Amazon, Microsoft, Nvidia and QualcommDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → as it seeks to build a domestic AI ecosystem.

The xAI–Humain partnership adds further momentum to this trend, signalling a deepening commercial relationship between Silicon Valley firms and Gulf governments even as longstanding human-rights concerns appear to have receded as barriers to cooperation.

Sources:
Humain
xAI
FWDstart
NBC News
Bloomberg
Reuters
The New York Times

J.V.