Qatar has created a new national AI company called Qai, becoming the latest Gulf state to channel sovereign wealth into artificial intelligence. The firm will sit under the Qatar Investment Authority, the country’s $524. billion sovereign fund, and will invest in AI infrastructure at home and globally while offering high-performance computing and a suite of tools for organisations in Qatar.
The announcement follows similar national strategies in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Abu Dhabi has G42 and its new $1 billion AI investment program, while Riyadh recently backed HUMAIN, its state supported AI champion that received approval from the US for tens of thousands of advanced chips last month.
Qatar has been slower to move, but the fund has stepped up its activity this year, including backing Anthropic’s $13 billion round in September. Qai signals a shift from passive investment to building domestic capabilities.
Abdulla Al-Misnad, from the prime minister’s office and formerly on the board of Doha Venture Capital, will serve as chair of the new firm. He said Qai will prioritise trusted AI systems and make it easier for individuals and businesses to deploy artificial intelligence confidently.
Qai will not build large language models. Instead, it plans to evaluate and commercialise foundation models built elsewhere and develop applied systems such as autonomous agents.
“We are thinking one, two, three years down the line. That is where you get value out of AI,” Al-Misnad told Bloomberg.
The move comes as the Middle East becomes a key destination for global tech companies seeking cheap energy and state backing to scale compute.
The US recently authorised the transfer of advanced Nvidia and AMD chips to the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Qatar would still need similar licences to import frontier semiconductors as it ramps up its AI ambitions.
