The UAE has said that it will invest $1 billion in AI infrastructure across Africa.

The announcement was made on Saturday at the G20 leaders’ summit in Johannesburg by UAE Minister of State Saeed Bin Mubarak Al Hajeri, who said that the funds would “provide access to AI computing power, technical expertise, and global partnerships.”

According to an additional statement issued by the Abu Dhabi Media Office, this will “support and finance artificial intelligence projects in African countries.”

Details about the investment timeline and the kinds of projects and infrastructure were not disclosed. Specific African countries were also not named.

The investment will be implemented by the Abu Dhabi Exports Office. This is a constituent part of the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development, which is the UAE’s foreign aid organization.

The UAE has become a major player in the data center space by building facilities at home while funneling capital into projects abroad.

The country's domestic efforts are spearheaded by Khazna Data Centers, and its international efforts typically involve MGX, an investment vehicle owned by the country’s sovereign wealth fund.

Just last week, the UAE agreed to invest a much larger sum of $50bn into Canada’s AI and energy projects.

Africa’s data center market is experiencing uneven growth. Data Center Map shows that 41 percent of the country’s market is located in three countries – South Africa, Kenya, and Nigeria – and a report issued by the International Energy Agency in 2024 stated that the continent had the world’s lowest data center electricity consumption per capita.