Reuters
- MGX backed Trump’s $500bn Stargate
- Focusing on AI
- Mubadala a founding partner
UAE technology investment company MGX emerged on to the global stage this week when it was announced as one of the core backers of Donald Trump’s $500 billion Stargate artificial intelligence programme.
Among the myriad announcements made in the opening days of Trump’s second stint as US president, was a $500-billion investment over four years to Stargate, an entity tasked with building “colossal” AI facilities across the country and creating 100,000 American jobs “almost immediately”, Trump said.
Funding for Trump’s project was committed by Japan’s SoftBank and US companies OpenAI and Oracle, with MGX named as a fourth company, to serve as an investment partner to the joint venture.
It is unclear how much MGX’s investment will be, but the company has been investing widely since it was launched by the newly created Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Technology Council in March last year.
“By collaborating closely with our global partners in investment, infrastructure, and technology, we aim to play a pivotal role in driving the next technological revolution,” Ahmed Yahya Al Idrisi, managing director and CEO of MGX said of the company’s global ambitions during its year-end board meeting last month.
The investment strategy of MGX said it will focus on three main areas: AI infrastructure, semiconductors and AI core technologies and applications, all of which present huge opportunities.
MGX can count on Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala as one of its two founding partners – Al Idrisi was previously CEO of Mubadala’s direct investments platform.
Mubadala has about $300 billion in assets under management and last year outpaced Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund in spending power.
MGX is chaired by UAE national security adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Mubadala CEO Khaldoon Al Mubarak is its vice chairman.
MGX’s other founding partner is Abu Dhabi-based AI company G42, which also has Mubadala as one of its partners.
G42 and MGX also have US private equity company Silver Lake as a partner. And Microsoft, which last year announced plans to invest $1.5 billion in G42 to help accelerate its global expansion strategy, is another partner of MGX.
These connections fit with MGX’s plans to “build one of the world’s most advanced AI ecosystems locally while partnering with global leaders in AI to create value and drive progress around the world,” as its website has it.
Bloomberg previously reported that MGX was looking to target AI and semiconductors deals and could surpass $100 billion of assets under management within the next few years.
Other investments to date include an undisclosed amount in the most recent round of funding for OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT.
In September, it joined the $30 billion Global AI Infrastructure Investment Partnership that will invest in building data centres and energy infrastructure. US-based BlackRock (another MGX partner), Global Infrastructure Partners and Microsoft are other members.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week, CEO of G42 Peng Xiao, who is also a board member of MGX, said: “We are a very active builder of AI infrastructure. So globally today we have about 60 gigawatts of data centre capacity. In our conservative joint assessment, the world needs more than 200GW, potentially over 300GW.”