Saudi Arabia\u2019s leading AI company HUMAIN plans to launch a major venture capital fund this year, potentially exceeding its planned $10 billion vehicle, as it seeks to establish the kingdom as a global AI leader. <\/p>\n
Buoyed by its early success backing Elon Musk\u2019s xAI ahead of its merger with SpaceX and initial public offering, the VC fund\u2019s ambitions have expanded significantly. It will have offices in the US and Saudi Arabia as well as France and the UK and \u201cwill be really large as we want to be able to accelerate the pace of investment,\u201d CEO Tareq Amin said, Semafor<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n HUMAIN\u2019s $3 billion investment in xAI in February \u201cwas a home run,\u201d Amin said in an interview. Saudi Arabia\u2019s sovereign wealth fund, which controls HUMAIN along with state oil company Aramco, has disclosed a $26 billion stake in SpaceX<\/a>.<\/p>\n The AI firm will back companies that commit to using Saudi data centers for some of their compute operations or bringing staff to the country, Amin said. \u201cWe don\u2019t do passive investments, that will never happen,\u201d he said. It will also create HUMAIN Limitless, specifically for investing in and supporting AI companies in Saudi Arabia, he said.<\/p>\n