UAE bets on US AI as Gulf emerges as battleground in US-China tech race

The United States and China are emerging as the two dominant powers in artificial intelligence — and countries around the world may soon have to decide which technological ecosystem they want to belong to.

For the United Arab Emirates, that choice has already been made.

According to political and AI analyst Obaid AlZaabi, the UAE has chosen Washington as it races to establish itself as a major AI hub for the Middle East and beyond.

“There are only a few actors in the AI race,” AlZaabi said. “Those are the US and China. And in the Middle East there are only two players really, which are the UAE and Israel.”

The UAE is not trying to compete directly with the United States in developing the most advanced AI models or chips. Instead, its ambition is to build the infrastructure needed to power the technology.

AlZaabi points to the UAE’s energy resources, capital and growing computing infrastructure as key advantages. “The UAE aims to take all the compute from West Asia, North Africa, East Africa, Central Asia, the subcontinent and the Balkans as the major hub for compute,” he said.

The strategy relies heavily on access to advanced chips, however — an area where the US maintains a dominant position. “In the AI game, the US has a dominant position,” AlZaabi said. “They hold all the chips. They have the agents, the models, they have the chip production.”

That technological advantage is increasingly becoming a geopolitical tool.

AlZaabi says the UAE previously maintained close relationships with both Washington and Beijing, but that the strategic importance of AI has made neutrality more difficult.

“The UAE was very close to the US and China,” he said. “But the US has made it clear: if you want to be part of the AI revolution, you have to do it with them exclusively. So the UAE had to pick — and we picked the United States.”

AlZaabi believes that choice could become increasingly important as the US-China technology rivalry expands beyond individual AI models and into the infrastructure supporting them.

He points to competing satellite systems as an early example of a broader technological divide, arguing that countries could eventually find themselves operating within separate US- and China-led technology ecosystems.

“It’s no longer a question of what’s going to happen,” he said. “We know what’s going to happen. The US and China will have their own two sovereign AIs.”

For countries caught between the two powers, he argues, remaining outside either system could carry a high cost. “If you don’t work with them, you will be in a very weak situation,” AlZaabi said. “You’ll basically not have a space.”

For the UAE, the objective is therefore not simply to import American AI, but to secure a stake in the infrastructure behind it. “The UAE could be described as buying into the order,” AlZaabi said. “But… the UAE is contributing in such a way that it’s taking ownership — and let’s say equity — in the system.”

Ultimately, he sees the UAE becoming a regional hub for American AI.

“The UAE is building the energy infrastructure, the compute infrastructure and the political infrastructure to be the hub for American AI in Asia and the Middle East,” he said.

For Abu Dhabi, the bet is that computing power will become a strategic resource on the scale of the infrastructure that transformed the Gulf’s economy in previous generations.

And as the competition between Washington and Beijing intensifies, the UAE may be betting not only on AI itself — but on choosing the right side of the emerging technological divide.