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The United Arab Emirates’ chief will meet US President Joe Biden in Washington on Monday to debate synthetic intelligence co-operation because the Gulf nation tries to safe simpler entry to superior US-made expertise.
The assembly comes throughout Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan’s first official journey to the US in seven years and underscores his willpower to win White Home help in his efforts to rework the UAE into an AI chief.
The UAE is among the US’s most essential allies within the Center East, however relations have been strained at instances in recent times. Talks for a proper safety pact with Washington have stalled, and Abu Dhabi was infuriated by what it noticed as a lukewarm US response to assaults on the UAE’s capital by Houthi rebels from Yemen in 2022.
But AI has introduced recent power to the connection. Oil-rich Abu Dhabi has made AI central to its plan to wean itself off fossil gas exports, and has taken a strategic resolution to associate with American corporations producing cutting-edge expertise.
“AI and new adjustments in cloud computing, and so forth, are going to vary the best way the world appears to be like,” Anwar Gargash, Sheikh Mohamed’s diplomatic adviser, informed journalists in Dubai final week. “We can not let this kind of wave of technological breakthroughs go by us.”
“If we consider that hydrocarbon is on the best way out, slowly however absolutely, then now we have to exchange the income stream by way of one thing else,” he added.
Nevertheless, the US final 12 months added the Gulf states to an inventory of nations restricted from freely importing cutting-edge US-made AI chips over issues about expertise leaks to China. This implies corporations have to use for licences to export the chips, and the method has held up some UAE corporations’ AI plans.
Two individuals briefed on the UAE’s plans mentioned they had been anticipating the 2 presidents to agree on a doc laying out a broad framework for US-UAE co-operation on AI.
One of many individuals mentioned the UAE wished to sketch out a “street map” forward of the upcoming US election “in order that progress is locked in . . . no matter president assumes workplace in January”.
The particular person added that officers had been aiming to get the UAE’s export designation modified so it will be simpler to pay money for chips.
Brad Smith, president of Microsoft, which invested $1.5bn within the UAE’s most essential AI group G42 in April, informed the FT final week that readability over the export controls was “rising” though it had “taken a number of months to work by way of”.
Smith added that export purposes by Microsoft and different expertise corporations weren’t totally full however had been “getting very shut”.
In an indication of the UAE’s drive to deepen relationships with US corporations, G42 introduced final week that it was partnering with Nvidia, the US firm that makes chips essential for AI, on a climate forecasting initiative.
US corporations seeking to finance costly AI tasks have additionally welcomed Abu Dhabi’s petrodollars.
MGX, a brand new Abu Dhabi funding car devoted to AI, final week introduced that it was becoming a member of with asset supervisor BlackRock, World Infrastructure Companions and Microsoft to launch a $30bn fund to spend money on information centres and the power to energy them.
Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the UAE nationwide safety adviser who chairs G42, visited Washington in June and has spearheaded the UAE’s efforts to safe US backing for its AI ambitions.
The FT has beforehand reported that OpenAI founder Sam Altman and Sheikh Tahnoon had been in discussions to finance an formidable chipmaking undertaking.
Gargash mentioned Sheikh Tahnoon had “an excellent understanding of tech”, suggesting this might assist the UAE’s negotiations with US officers and executives. “When he sits with any individual like Altman or no matter, he’s actually speaking his language,” mentioned Gargash.
