BATOOL GHAITH (ABU DHABI)
As artificial intelligence reshapes the global economy, the UAE is positioning itself not just as an adopter but a leader of how AI is built, governed and scaled.
Anchored in a clear national vision and reinforced by global partnerships, the country is creating an ecosystem designed to move innovation from pilot projects to real-world impact.
Speaking to Aletihad, Marc Hamilton, Vice President of Solutions Architecture and Engineering at NVIDIA, said the UAE’s AI agenda provides a critical advantage. “It acts as an architectural blueprint that allows enterprises to move from experiments to AI at scale.”
Hamilton said clear national priorities around sovereign AI, safety and skills give companies the confidence to invest in AI factories, digital twins, and industry platforms, knowing they align with policy, have access to talent, and can safely operate mission-critical models.
Across sectors including aviation, oil and gas, and smart cities, AI is no longer a distant concept in the UAE, he said. Drawing on NVIDIA’s collaborative projects with multiple entities in the country, Hamilton noted that AI is already powering live innovation.
UAE developers, he added, are gaining hands-on experience with advanced AI platforms such as Omniverse for digital twin simulations, NeMo for training foundation models, and Metropolis for computer vision applications. “Physical AI and digital twins are revolutionising UAE industries through NVIDIA Omniverse-powered simulations,” he noted.
In the oil and gas sector, operators are deploying digital twins for predictive maintenance, reducing unplanned shutdowns while optimising production through virtual reservoir modelling, Hamilton said. Aviation and smart cities, meanwhile, are leveraging NVIDIA Metropolis with vision language models for real-time operational monitoring and infrastructure planning.
In Abu Dhabi, G42’s collaboration with NVIDIA on Earth-2 delivers hyper-local 200-metre resolution weather forecasting, enabling proactive emergency response, he added.
The UAE’s commitment to AI is backed by a comprehensive national strategy aimed at positioning the country as a global AI leader by 2031.
The UAE National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence 2031 supports broader goals by integrating AI into government services, building a thriving AI ecosystem, attracting and training talent, and boosting competitiveness in priority sectors such as healthcare, education, transportation and energy.
In line with this vision, 2025 saw the Technology Innovation Institute (TII), the applied research arm of Abu Dhabi’s Advanced Technology Research Council (ATRC), formally launch the Middle East’s first joint AI and robotics research lab with NVIDIA.
The collaboration establishes a regional hub focused on developing next-generation AI models, robotics platforms, and humanoid technologies – accelerating innovation across sectors and reinforcing the UAE’s growing role on the global AI stage.