Microsoft x G42 (strategic investment)

G42 is an Abu Dhabi technology holding company founded in 2018 and chaired by Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE's National Security Advisor. Its group CEO, Peng Xiao, has built G42 into the anchor of the UAE's national AI strategy, spanning cloud infrastructure (Core42), analytics (Presight), healthcare (M42), satellite (Space42), and a controlling stake in Khazna Data Centers, the UAE's largest colocation operator. Mubadala is the majority sponsor; Silver Lake, Microsoft, and the Dalio Family Office are minority holders.\n\nOn the datacenter side, G42's exposure flows through Khazna, which is co-owned with MGX and Silver Lake and led by CEO Hassan Alnaqbi. Khazna runs a portfolio of hyperscale sites across the UAE (Abu Dhabi and Dubai clusters plus an announced Ajman AI campus) and has been retrofitting facilities such as AUH6 for GPU workloads. The flagship next-generation project is Stargate UAE, unveiled in May 2025 with OpenAI, Oracle, Nvidia, SoftBank, and Cisco, targeting a 5 GW campus in Abu Dhabi with a 1 GW first phase slated to come online in 2026.\n\nG42's trajectory pivoted in 2024 when Microsoft made a $1.5 billion strategic investment, put Vice Chair Brad Smith on the board, and secured commitments that G42 would divest Chinese holdings and standardize on Azure. That deal reset the company as a US-aligned AI infrastructure vehicle for the Gulf and positioned it as the operating counterpart to MGX, the sovereign AI fund also chaired by Sheikh Tahnoun.

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) develops AI, cloud computing, and enterprise software. Azure AI provides infrastructure for autonomous systems and robotics. M12 (Microsoft's venture arm) invests in robotics and AI startups. Partnered with [Openai](/companies/openai) for GPT integration across products.