GCC AI Research

This Week Inception

UAE Abu Dhabi's CPX-Core42 merger plans have cyber providers worried - Intelligence Online

Inception · · Notable

Summary

Abu Dhabi's cybersecurity group CPX is set to merge with AI firm Core42, creating a potentially dominant entity in the UAE's digital security landscape. This consolidation raises concerns among smaller cyber providers who fear being squeezed out of the market. CPX's existing government contracts, combined with Core42's AI capabilities, could create an unfair competitive advantage. Why it matters: The merger highlights the UAE's strategy to centralize its AI and cybersecurity capabilities, but also raises questions about market competition and the role of smaller players in the country's tech ecosystem.

Keywords

CPX · Core42 · merger · Abu Dhabi · cybersecurity

Get the weekly digest

Top AI stories from the GCC region, every week.

Related

UAE to deploy 8 exaflop supercomputer in India to strengthen local sovereign AI infrastructure

MBZUAI ·

G42 and Cerebras, in partnership with MBZUAI and C-DAC, will deploy an 8 exaflop AI supercomputer in India. The system will operate under India's governance frameworks, with all data remaining within national jurisdiction to meet sovereign security and compliance requirements. The supercomputer will be accessible to Indian researchers, startups, and government entities under the India AI Mission.

The Future of AI in the GCC Post-NPM Landscape: A Comparative Analysis of Kuwait and the UAE

arXiv ·

This study compares AI uptake in the UAE and Kuwait, analyzing how constitutional, collective-choice, and operational rules shape AI implementation and its impact on citizen centricity and public value creation. It finds that the UAE's concentrated authority and pro-innovation environment enable scaling AI initiatives, while Kuwait's dispersed governance and cautious approach limit progress despite similar resources. The research highlights the importance of vertical rule coherence over wealth in determining AI's public-value yield.

Datacenters in the Desert: Feasibility and Sustainability of LLM Inference in the Middle East

arXiv ·

This paper analyzes the energy consumption and carbon footprint of LLM inference in the UAE compared to Iceland, Germany, and the USA. The study uses DeepSeek Coder 1.3B and the HumanEval dataset to evaluate code generation. It provides a comparative analysis of geographical trade-offs for climate-aware AI deployment, specifically addressing the challenges and potential of datacenters in desert regions.

Artificial intelligence and the Gulf Cooperation Council workforce adapting to the future of work

arXiv ·

This study assesses workforce preparedness for AI in the GCC region, using socio-technical systems theory to analyze national AI strategies and initiatives in KSA, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman. The research combines TF-IDF analysis, case studies of MBZUAI and SDAIA Academy, and scenario planning to evaluate the balance between technical capacity and social alignment. The study identifies a potential two-track talent system and emphasizes the importance of regulatory convergence for successful AI adoption.