Abu Dhabi's 5GW 'Stargate'

Abu Dhabi artificial intelligence firm AIQ is preparing to sell energy software in the United States and Canada as the emirate builds out giant computing capacity at home. (thenationalnews.com) AIQ chief executive Magzhan Kenesbai said the company is targeting North America after deploying its products with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, known as Adnoc, in the United Arab Emirates. AIQ was formed as a joint venture between Adnoc and Presight. (msn.com) The backdrop is Stargate UAE, a 5-gigawatt artificial intelligence campus in Abu Dhabi announced on May 22, 2025 by G42, OpenAI, Oracle, Nvidia, Cisco and SoftBank. The Abu Dhabi Media Office said the wider UAE-U.S. campus spans 10 square miles, about 25.9 square kilometres. (g42.ai) (mediaoffice.abudhabi) That scale matters because artificial intelligence systems are built on data centres that consume huge amounts of electricity, chips and cooling equipment. OpenAI said the first Stargate UAE cluster is designed for 1 gigawatt, with 200 megawatts expected to go live in 2026. (openai.com) The project also ties Gulf capital to U.S. infrastructure. OpenAI said the agreement includes UAE investment into U.S. Stargate infrastructure, while the Abu Dhabi Media Office said UAE entities would expand digital infrastructure investments in the United States. (openai.com) (mediaoffice.abudhabi) AIQ’s pitch is narrower than the giant campus behind it. Its software is aimed at oil and gas operations, where companies use artificial intelligence to sift through field data, predict equipment failures and raise output from existing wells. (msn.com) That gives Abu Dhabi two export lines at once: computing capacity through Stargate and industry software through AIQ. The partner list around Stargate shows how the business is splitting between those who finance power-hungry campuses and those who build applications on top of them. (softbank.jp) (cnbc.com) For now, the timeline is still the key test. The first 200 megawatts are due in 2026, and AIQ is using that build-out to make its case that Abu Dhabi can export artificial intelligence products, not just oil. (openai.com) (msn.com)