Qatar’s $524 billion sovereign wealth fund is accelerating investments in American artificial intelligence and data infrastructure through recent deals with Blue Owl Capital, Anthropic and xAI.
The Qatar Investment Authority committed approximately $1 billion in new equity to a data centre venture with Blue Owl Capital this month, joined Anthropic’s $13 billion funding round, and participated in xAI’s $10 billion raise that valued the company at $200 billion, reports Bloomberg.
The deals demonstrate Qatar’s swift progress on a pledge made during US President Donald Trump’s visit to the region in May to channel an additional $500 billion into America over the next decade.
“The US is a top priority market for QIA and this year we have made a large commitment to significantly expand our US investments in strategic sectors,” said Chief Executive Officer Mohammed Al Sowaidi. “We support around 300,000 jobs in the US through our investments and we expect this to increase exponentially as we grow our portfolio.”
Technology will be a key element of the fresh outlays, with the US seen as an attractive destination for investments in AI, chip technology and advanced manufacturing, according to a person familiar with the fund’s thinking.
The investment push comes after Israeli strikes on Doha rattled leaders across the Gulf. However, Al Sowaidi’s comments indicate Qatar will separate investment decisions from geopolitical volatility. Karen Young, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, said the decision to allocate investment in AI with US partners and build data centres globally makes business sense for QIA regardless of bilateral tensions.
The fund has already invested in technology firms including Databricks, recently valued at more than $100 billion, Applied Intuition, a California-based provider for autonomous vehicles and drones, and Elon Musk ventures including SpaceX and Neuralink.
Qatar’s expansion plans for liquefied natural gas output are set to add more than $30 billion a year to state revenue, a portion of which will flow into the wealth fund. The QIA expects to complete as many as 25 technology deals this year and next, a senior executive has previously told Bloomberg News.
Beyond technology and data centres, the fund is targeting health care, industrials, supply chains, infrastructure and real estate in the US, where most of its global health care investments are based.
