Despite the continuing conflict with Iran, Gulf countries have not abandoned their AI ambitions, and demand for the infrastructure needed to develop the technology remains strong, a senior Nvidia official said on Wednesday.“The imperatives these countries see have not changed, they still see it as an opportunity to diversify their economies,” Ruth Berry, who leads global policy on Nvidia’s government affairs team, said during a discussion at the Washington-based Middle East Institute. “Infrastructure is really sticky,” she added, referring to continued global demand for Nvidia’s graphics processing units (GPUs), which power much of today’s AI infrastructure.Ms Berry said countries in the region continue to have a "clear vision for where they want to go on AI", which bodes well for future plans. The UAE, which has developed several investment partnerships with the US technology giant, is among the countries pressing ahead.In May, the first shipments of Nvidia's highly sought CPUs and GPUs arrived in the UAE, the country's ambassador announced. In recent years, the UAE has sought to buy and use Nvidia's chips for its AI plans. Stringent export controls aimed at protecting the US lead in AI made such purchases difficult.Washington eventually approved the shipments after the UAE provided security assurances intended to prevent the chips from being accessed by unauthorised parties.B...
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