GCC AI News — 23 Oct 2026

At Nvidia's GTC conference in Berlin on 22 October, Saudi AI company HUMAIN announced it is expanding its Nvidia partnership to build up to 84 megawatts of AI computing capacity, about 27,000 GPUs, in two phases. Phase one is 14MW of Blackwell HGX B300 systems, roughly 6,000 GPUs, deploying from the fourth quarter of 2026 to serve HUMAIN Cloud customers including AI companies, government entities and businesses. Phase two adds 70MW of next-generation Vera Rubin infrastructure, about 21,000 GPUs, from mid-2027. HUMAIN, owned by the Public Investment Fund and chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, plans about 3GW of data-center capacity by 2030 as part of Vision 2030.

Compute is the foundation of every AI service, and Saudi Arabia is building it at national scale. The expansion strengthens the Kingdom's push to become a global AI hub, giving local institutions and businesses sovereign access to frontier-class hardware at home.

A Saudi government agency or startup can rent HUMAIN Cloud capacity to run advanced AI workloads inside the Kingdom, keeping data local while tapping some of the most powerful chips available, instead of sending work to distant overseas data centers.

On 20 October, the UAE's Federal Tax Authority launched what it calls the world's first AI-powered digital platform for tourist VAT refunds, cutting the refund time from about nine days to one business day. Built with Planet, the authorised refund operator, the fully paperless system uses AI-powered facial recognition and smart data matching: tourists register in a mobile app by scanning their face, passport and card, then scan a QR code at the airport. AI routes each traveller through the right process, auto-approving transactions that need no inspection so many can finish entirely in-app. It is live at Zayed International, Dubai International and Sharjah International airports, with tourist satisfaction at 93% in 2026.

This is AI improving an everyday experience for millions of visitors, not an abstract pilot. Turning a slow, paper-heavy process into a one-day, mostly self-service journey showcases the UAE's 'zero bureaucracy' ambitions and sets a global benchmark other tourist economies will study.

A visitor who shops in Dubai can complete their entire VAT refund from their phone, scanning a QR code at the airport and getting the money back within a business day, instead of queuing at a counter and waiting over a week.

Qatar's Amir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, ratified Cabinet Decision No. 34 of 2026 establishing a National Center for Artificial Intelligence, announced by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology on 19 October. Reporting directly to the Minister and comprising three departments, the centre will lead and coordinate national AI efforts, prepare and monitor the National AI Strategy, develop regulatory frameworks and policies, help government entities adopt AI applications, and promote data use across sectors. It will also build AI platforms, provide technical support, conduct research, and foster partnerships with government, the private sector and academia. A new Training and Digital Capability Development Department was created alongside it.

Scattered AI projects are hard to scale; a single national centre gives Qatar one place to set strategy, standards and support. It signals a shift from experimentation to coordinated, country-wide delivery under the Digital Agenda 2030 and the Third National Development Strategy.

A Qatari ministry or hospital wanting to deploy AI can turn to the National Center for guidance, shared platforms and technical support, rather than each entity building capability alone, speeding responsible adoption across the public sector.

On 21 October, Abu Dhabi's Khalifa University unveiled InstrucTwin, a UAE-developed agentic AI platform for education, commercialised through Khalifa University Enterprises Company. Rather than a single general chatbot, it brings together specialised AI agents across the education cycle: personalised learning, lesson and assessment development, grading and feedback, learning-gap identification, institutional analytics and professional development. Crucially, it operates within curriculum requirements, institutional rules, permissions and human oversight, so educators keep judgement and accountability. More than 21,400 educators have already received AI professional development on InstrucTwin, including advanced training for over 170 designated AI Leads, through a collaboration with Abu Dhabi's Department of Education and Knowledge.

Generative AI is flooding classrooms faster than the guardrails for it. A governed, curriculum-grounded platform that keeps teachers in charge offers a responsible model for school-wide adoption, and being built in the UAE adds sovereign capability in a sensitive public domain.

A teacher can use InstrucTwin's agents to plan lessons, draft assessments and give students adaptive, curriculum-aligned tutoring, while retaining final control over grades and interventions, saving preparation time without handing decisions to a black box.

On 22 October, Oman launched the second phase of its National Digital Economy Programme (2026-2030), targeting an annual contribution of OMR 1.5 billion to GDP, OMR 300 million in technology investment and 3,000 new direct jobs each year. Officials revealed the digital economy now accounts for 9% of Oman's GDP. The phase focuses on digitalising strategic sectors, expanding e-commerce and digital payments, supporting SMEs' digital transformation, and accelerating AI adoption. The ceremony also launched a Strategic Intelligence Platform, developed with the World Economic Forum, to support policymaking through data analysis. Officials cited the training of AI and semiconductor specialists, the development of 50 AI products, and Omanisation in tech professions rising to 72%.

Oman is tying AI to concrete economic targets, GDP, investment and jobs, rather than treating it as a standalone tech ambition. Anchoring adoption in a broader digital-economy plan under Vision 2040 is how AI translates into real growth and employment for citizens.

An Omani SME can tap the programme's support to adopt AI in marketing, inventory, supply chains and customer service, while young Omanis gain access to new technology jobs created as the digital economy expands.

Emirates NBD and OpenAI announced an enterprise collaboration making the Dubai-based group the first bank in the MENA region to deploy OpenAI's GPT models using in-country inference infrastructure in the UAE. The bank will apply the models across intelligent customer engagement on digital channels, risk and compliance analytics, automation of knowledge-intensive workflows and employee productivity, connecting them to its internal systems, APIs and enterprise data. Group Chief Digital and Information Officer Miguel Rio-Tinto said AI is a core capability that will define how the bank builds, serves and scales. The deployment supports the UAE's National Strategy for AI 2031 and its push for sovereign AI that meets local governance and regulatory requirements.

Banks handle highly sensitive data and strict regulation, so running frontier AI on in-country infrastructure, rather than sending data abroad, is a meaningful proof point. It shows sovereign AI capability maturing to the point where regulated industries can adopt it confidently.

An Emirates NBD customer could get faster, more personalised digital banking and smarter fraud monitoring, while the bank keeps the underlying data and AI processing within the UAE's governance and regulatory perimeter.

On 21 October, full-stack AI company Aleria announced it is expanding its sovereign AI capacity in the UAE through a dedicated 60MW data center that will run about 14,000 Nvidia Rubin GPUs, alongside 6,000 Nvidia Groq 3 LPX accelerators, 8,000 Nvidia Vera CPUs and Nvidia's context-memory storage integrated with Dynamo, backed by multiple petabytes of a high-throughput data layer. Aleria's intelligence layer connects the computing platform with workload orchestration, data management, agentic AI and enterprise applications. The capacity targets large-scale AI training and inference for critical environments across the UAE. CEO Eric Leandri said the question is no longer why sovereign AI matters, but how quickly capacity can be added to meet demand.

Demand for locally operated AI is outpacing supply, and sovereign capacity lets UAE organisations run demanding workloads without depending on infrastructure abroad. Expanding a model already running real workloads, rather than announcing a greenfield promise, shows the market maturing.

A UAE enterprise or government body with sensitive data can train and serve large AI models on Aleria's in-country infrastructure, getting frontier-scale compute while keeping critical workloads and data under national jurisdiction.

The National Bank of Bahrain Group, comprising NBB and Bahrain Islamic Bank, reported progress on AI@NBB, its enterprise-wide initiative to scale AI responsibly. Having built the foundations, piloting applications, setting an institutional AI roadmap, enabling secure enterprise AI tools and defining an operating model, the group is now extending execution across customer experience, employee productivity, risk management and operational resilience. Visible applications already include an AI-powered customer-service virtual assistant, cybersecurity response, internal audit and legal AI capabilities, agentic policy and documentation management, and select HR processes. A federated operating model combines central oversight with business ownership, AI Champions and cross-functional AI Squads, with each use case subject to defined controls, human oversight and measurement against agreed outcomes.

Many organisations get stuck at AI pilots. A deliberate, governed rollout with clear controls and measured outcomes shows how a regulated institution can scale AI responsibly, a template for Bahrain's wider financial sector and Economic Vision 2030.

An NBB customer can get instant help from an AI virtual assistant for routine banking queries, while the bank's staff use AI tools for audit, legal and documentation work, with human oversight on every use case, freeing people for higher-value tasks.

On 22 October, Otech, the technology arm of Omantel, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with global technology firm Publicis Sapient to explore collaboration aimed at accelerating enterprise AI adoption and technology transformation across Oman, the Middle East and Africa. The proposed partnership would combine Otech's regional capabilities, spanning cloud, infrastructure, cybersecurity, enterprise platforms, smart-city solutions and managed services, with Publicis Sapient's enterprise AI platforms and sector expertise. Together they aim to help organisations modernise legacy systems, adopt and scale AI, and move from experimentation to practical implementation that delivers measurable business outcomes, with potential cooperation on solution design, innovation workshops and joint market initiatives. The MoU reflects both companies' ambition to contribute to Oman's digital economy.

Access to compute is only half the equation; turning it into working enterprise AI requires integration expertise. Connecting Oman's local technology provider with a global AI platform firm helps businesses cross the hard gap from pilots to real, measurable deployments.

An Omani company weighed down by legacy IT can draw on the Otech-Publicis Sapient collaboration to modernise its systems and deploy AI in operations and customer experience, with local support and global know-how instead of going it alone.

On the sidelines of the 30th GCC Ministerial Committee Meeting for Postal and Telecommunications Affairs, held in Bahrain and reported on 19 October, Saudi Arabia's Minister of Communications and IT, Abdullah Al-Swaha, met counterparts from Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar to strengthen cooperation in digital infrastructure, telecommunications, AI and advanced technologies. With Kuwait's Minister of State for Communications and IT, Omar Saud Al-Omar, discussions focused on developing the digital regulatory environment, improving telecoms-infrastructure readiness and expanding cooperation in advanced technologies. Talks with Bahrain and Qatar covered digital connectivity, joint investment in data centres, AI collaboration and support for technology companies looking to grow, reflecting a push to coordinate initiatives and support regional integration across the Gulf.

The Gulf states are each building AI capacity, but coordinating regulation, data-centre investment and connectivity multiplies the payoff. Closer cooperation helps smaller markets like Kuwait and Bahrain share infrastructure and standards, strengthening the GCC as an integrated AI region rather than competing silos.

A Kuwaiti tech company could benefit from harmonised Gulf digital regulations and shared data-centre investment, making it easier to operate and scale AI services across multiple GCC markets under more consistent rules.