#UAE #Germany #bilaterals - The UAE has announced plans to invest 40 billion euros in Germany across industry, advanced technology, artificial intelligence, digital infrastructure and energy, timed to coincide with the state visit of UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to Berlin. Of the total, 10 billion euros will go specifically to the German state of Bavaria, a leading European technology and innovation hub,. The announcement builds on growing momentum in UAE-Germany relations and follows similar scale investment agreements struck with France and Italy last year.
SO WHAT? - The Germany pledge follows a pattern the UAE has now repeated across three major European economies in the space of 18 months. It committed $40 billion to Italy and up to €50 billion to France, both deals built around AI, advanced technology and infrastructure rather than traditional sectors like real estate or hospitality. In France, that translated into a 1.4 gigawatt Paris AI campus backed by Abu Dhabi’s tech investment fund MGX, Bpifrance, Mistral AI and Nvidia. Meanwhile, Abu Dhabi's G42 backed large-scale AI compute clusters in Grenoble and Italy. The Germany deal extends the same playbook to Europe's largest economy, and suggests more announcements on specific investments are still to come.
KEY POINTS:
The United Arab Emirates plans to invest 40 billion euros in Germany, spanning industry, advanced technology, artificial intelligence, digital infrastructure and energy. The announcement was made during the state visit of UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to Berlin.
The UAE President was accompanied by several ministers and senior UAE officials including His Excellency Faisal Al Bannai, Advisor to the UAE President for Strategic Research and Advanced Technology Affairs. Al Bannai is also Secretary General of the Advanced Technology Research Council (ATRC)l, Chairman of Abu Dhabi's advanced defence technology group EDGE and Chairman of the ATRC’s AI company AI71.
Of the total investment, 10 billion euros will be allocated to the German state of Bavaria, a hub for Germany’s automotive, engineering and technology industries.
The announcement builds on growing momentum in UAE-Germany relations, reflecting the UAE’s stated confidence in Germany’s industrial, technological and innovation capabilities.
The investment combines Germany’s advanced industrial, technological and research capabilities with the UAE’s investment expertise and capacity to support and scale major projects.
Officials said the bilateral agreement creates new opportunities for companies and institutions in both countries to establish long-term partnerships. The deal also stands to deepen cooperation in sectors expected to drive growth and competitiveness over coming decades.
The partnership is also expected to become a platform for exchanging knowledge, skills and experience between the two countries, supporting the UAE’s ambitions to build a knowledge and innovation-driven economy.
Beyond its financial scale, the investment is positioned as the foundation for a long-term strategic partnership between Germany and the UAE.
ZOOM OUT - The Germany deal is consistent with UAE policy since 2023, when it began treating digital infrastructure investment as a standard component of bilateral agreements. By May 2024, Invest UAE had signed ten digital infrastructure memorandums, with partners including Egypt, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Greece and Uzbekistan, targeting a combined 7 to 8 gigawatts of data centre capacity worth an estimated $60 billion or more. Subsequent bilateral agreements with France, Italy and the USA in 2025 were all heavily focused on AI, technology exchange and AI infrastructure build-outs. In parallel, Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth funds have been targeting large-scale AI infrastructure investments globally. The combination of bilateral agreements and commercial deals via funds are thought to equate to hundreds of millions of dollars worth of AI infrastructure investments.
[Written and edited with the assistance of AI]
Source: Emirates News Agency, MEAIN
Read more about the UAE’s bilateral digital investment deals:
US-UAE Science & Technology Agreement back on the table (Middle East AI News)
Seoul targets $35 billion in UAE AI, defence deals (Middle East AI News)
White House: UAE commits to $1.4T in US investment (Middle East AI News)
AI close to the heart of UAE-Italy $40B investment deal (Middle East AI News)
France & UAE sign $50 billion AI pact (Middle East AI News)