Aramco reveals 250B LLM; GAIA backed by $1 billion funding
Aramco reveals 250B LLM; GAIA backed by $1 billion funding
Middle East AI News weekly digest...
Good morning!
Welcome to this week’s Middle East AI News!
LEAP 2024 dominated the headlines this week with initiatives, deals, investments and new funds worth more than $13 billion. Top AI news announcements included $1 billion backing for Riyadh’s GenAI accelerator, an initiative to upscale the Kingdom’s AI R&D capacity, the launch of Saudi Aramco’s industrial grade LLM, and a new Arabic LLM trained exclusively on Saudi data sets.
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/Carrington
Startups
Saudi backs GAIA with $1 billion
#Saudi #Accelerators - The government of Saudi Arabia plans to put $1 billion behind GAIA, its generative AI startup accelerator programme. H.E. Abdullah Alswaha, Minister of Communications and Information Technology, announced the new funding at the Kingdom’s annual IT mega-show LEAP. (Middle East AI News)
Beta Lab launches 2024 DeepTech program
#Saudi #deeptech - Beta Lab has opened its 2024 DeepTech Startups Program for registrations. The programme is run by Saudi’s Ministry of Investment, the FII Institute and KBW Ventures. The DeepTech Startups Program focuses on biotech, foodtech, and AI. Register here before April 15th. (LinkedIn)
Synexty secures $500k pre-seed via DeepMinds
#Saudi #funding - Synexty has secured $500k pre-seed funding via a partnership deal with Abu Dhabi-based DeepMinds, to launch Vitalls.AI. The GenAI health companion, provides individuals with highly secured access to their complete health history anytime, anywhere. (Zawya)
$838 million of new tech funds announced at LEAP
#Saudi #funds - Seven new startup funds worth $838 million were announced at LEAP24 in Riyadh. All are Saudi or Middle East and North Africa focused (and one includes Pakistan and Turkey). Full list with backers, fund managers and fund values in my LinkedIn post. (LinkedIn)
stc launches Tali Ventures
#Saudi #funds - Saudi telecom stc has launched a new venture capital arm, called Tali Ventures. The fund will focus on early stage tech startups, in such fields as AI, fintech, cloud services, IoT, cybersecurity and other digital sectors. (Arab News)
LLMs
Aramco reveals world's largest industrial LLM!
#Saudi #LLMs - Aramco, Saudi Arabia's national oil company, announced a 250 billion parameter large language model at LEAP24: the world's largest industrial LLM. Called METABRAIN, the AI model was trained on 7 trillion data tokens of public and internal Aramco data, based on about 90 years of data. (Middle East AI News)
First LLM trained exclusively on Saudi data sets
#Saudi #LLMs - Riyadh and Alkhobar-based technology company Watad has announced Mulhem, the first Saudi Arabia domain-specific LLM trained exclusively on Saudi data sets. The 7 billion parameter AI model was developed and trained on 90 billion Arabic and 90 billion English data tokens. (Middle East AI News)
ServiceNow to invest $500m in KSA, develop Arabic LLMs
#Saudi #investment - ServiceNow is to open regional headquarters in Riyadh, with a plan to invest $500 million. With partnerships with The Garage and the Saudi Digital Academy, ServiceNow will launch an Arabic platform later this month and will develop domain-specific Arabic LLMs to support customers. (Edge Middle East)
LEAP24
LEAP 2024 unveils almost $13 billion in tech investments
#Saudi #LEAP - LEAP, the global tech summit being held in Riyadh, announced a staggering $11.9 billion in investment on Day One of the event, followed by many more initiatives and investments during the show period. (WIRED)
Digital Transformation
ADNOC generates $500 million value with AI
#UAE #ROI - Abu Dhabi's ADNOC has generated $500 million in value during 2023 by deploying AI solutions. The value was generated from 30 industry-leading AI tools integrated across ADNOC's full value chain, from field operations to senior decision-making. (Emirates News Agency)
R&D
NTDP announces $266m programme to support AI R&D
#Saudi #R&D - Saudi’s National Technology Development Program (NTDP), announced M AI Mission at LEAP, a new programme to build R&D infrastructure, create up to 100 AI-native ventures and build 20 to 25 AI foundation models, all within 5 years. (LinkedIn)
KACST and Animoca in R&D deal
#Saudi #blockchain - King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) signed an agreement with Animoca Brands during LEAP, to drive joint R&D for blockchain applications, games, AI and metaverse. (Lara-on-the-block)
Cloud
AWS to invest $5.3 billion in KSA
#Saudi #cloud - Amazon Web Services (AWS) is to create an infrastructure region in Saudi Arabia by 2026, with an investment exceeding $5.3 billion (approximately SR19.88 billion). The move will upgrade services provided to end-users directly in the Kingdom, whilst ensuring data residency preferences are met. (Saudi Gazette)
Naver, Aramco to develop sovereign AI, including Arabic
#Saudi #cloud - Korean internet giant Naver has signed a partnership with Aramco Digital, the technology subsidiary of Saudi Aramco, under which it will help the oil giant to develop a sovereign cloud, a super app and sovereign AI based on an Arabic large language model. (Korea Herald)
Semiconductor
Alat and KACST semiconductor initiative
#Saudi #semiconductor - Alat and King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) partner to support Saudi Arabia’s semiconductor industry. Alat will work closely with KACST on talent development and R&D to further Saudi Arabia’s National Strategy for Semiconductors. (UAENews247)
Autonomous Vehicles
Jahez starts autonomous food delivery trial
#Saudi #logistics - Online food delivery group Jahez, and Saudi Arabia's Transport General Authority, announced an autonomous food vehicle delivery trial during LEAP 2024. The food delivery trial consists of 10 Kiwibot robotic vehicles and will take place under the TGAs regulatory sandbox. (LinkedIn)
AI Hackathon
LEAP24 holds 72 hour AI hackathon
#Saudi #hackathon - LEAP24 held AI Oasis this week, a 72 hour AI hackathon with $200,000 in prize money. Run by New Native's Lablab.ai and powered by National Technology Development Program (NTDP), the hackathon invited developers to create AI applications for sustainability, health & wellness, biotech, or cognitive cities challenges. (LinkedIn)
Education
First observability academy in MEA
#Saudi #training - Datadog, which provides observability services for cloud-scale systems, announced the first observability academy in the MEA region during LEAP, in partnership with the Saudi Digital Academy. (LinkedIn)
Security
Dubai police to use robot dogs for high-risk situations
#UAE #robotics - Dubai Police is studying the use of robotic dogs to help in high-risk missions. The police force is already equipping police dogs with cameras and sensors that can be monitored by their handlers and control centres. Robotic dogs could later be used for identifying drugs or hazardous substances, search and rescue, or to assist bomb disposal teams. (Khaleej Times)