• With Tareq Amin at the helm, Saudi Arabia’s Humain sets out its AI stall
• AMD, Nvidia and Qualcomm are among the US chip vendor beneficiaries
• Deutsche Telekom is having a great 2025

In today’s industry news roundup: Humain is Saudi Arabia’s big entry into the global AI arena; Tareq Amin is Humain’s CEO and he already knows a lot of the tech big guns; Humain already has agreements with AMD, Nvidia, Qualcomm and more; and Deutsche Telekom had a great Q1 and has slightly updated its 2025 guidance. 

Move over The Stargate Project, the world of AI infrastructure just got a new superstar in the form of Humain, the new company funded by Saudi Arabia’s PIF (Public Investment Fund) and headed up by a figure very familiar to the telecom sector, Tareq Amin. But before we get to Amin… in a world awash with terrible company names, a hat tip to those humans (or software stacks!) who came up with this one – it’s clever! Back to Amin… the former CEO of Rakuten Mobile emerged as the CEO of Aramco Digital, the digital unit of Saudi oil giant Aramco, in late 2023 before going into stealth mode late last year saying he had a major new role that would be revealed in 2025. Now Amin is the CEO of Humain, which was unveiled by PIF earlier this week in this announcement, which noted that the new company plans to “provide a comprehensive range of AI services, products and tools, including next-generation datacentres, AI infrastructure and cloud capabilities, and advanced AI models and solutions. The company will also offer one of the world’s most powerful multimodal Arabic large language models (LLMs),” which refers to ALLaM. And here’s a knowing and telling statement: “PIF and its companies are actively investing in building an AI ecosystem and fostering international AI partnerships. These investments benefit from Saudi Arabia’s value proposition, including its strategic location at the nexus of three continents, which enables large volumes of data to be processed, as well as the country’s economic growth prospects and young, tech-savvy population, which support cutting-edge AI research and innovation.” It seems the Saudi-based datacentres will have a projected capacity of more than 1 gigawatt (GW): According to IBM, an average datacentre has between 2,000 and 5,000 servers and draws up to 100 megawatts (MW) of power, while a hyperscale datacentre has more than 5,000 servers and has an energy draw of more than 100 MW. But Humain’s plans aren’t just about building and running datacentres in Saudi: “The company will enable capabilities to develop and deliver AI solutions locally, regionally and globally.” Amin took to LinkedIn to share the following: “I am deeply humbled and excited to lead Humain as we embark on this incredible journey to power the AI-driven digital economy in Saudi Arabia. Our mission is to build a future where AI and human intelligence work in harmony, driving innovation and unlocking unprecedented opportunities for our nation and the world. We have secured key partnerships with global technology leaders, including AMD, Cisco, Qualcomm, AWS and Nvidia, to ensure our AI infrastructure is world-class, scalable, and built to push the boundaries of what’s possible. Together, we will shape a smarter, more connected future, empowering the next generation of innovators and businesses to thrive in the AI age.” 

Before we take a look at those tech partnerships, let’s see what other factors are at play here, especially with regards to the international strategy of US President Donald Trump’s administration. Humain was unveiled to coincide with the Saudi-US Investment Forum, which was attended by senior US officials and the heads of most of Humain’s tech partners, amongst many others. In addition, and importantly for Nvidia, AMD and Qualcomm, the US Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) announced that the AI Diffusion Rule announced in January by Joe Biden’s US administration, and which was due to come into effect on 15 May, had been rescinded by the Department of Commerce. That rule had set out tiers of countries based on whether they had no restrictions on AI chip exports, whether licences were required, or whether such exports were barred altogether. Saudi Arabia was in the tier that required licences for US AI chip exports…. But no longer! The BIS explained that the Biden rules “would have stifled American innovation and saddled companies with burdensome new regulatory requirements. The AI Diffusion Rule would have also undermined US diplomatic relations with dozens of countries by downgrading them to second-tier status.” So the door was immediately open for unfettered trade by US chip companies with Saudi Arabia and many other nations. At the same time, the US also wants to thwart the growing competitive threat from China, which has very strong and positive links with Middle East nations, so the BIS also announced “actions to strengthen export controls for overseas AI chips”, including:

• Issuing guidance alerting industry to the risks of using PRC [People’s Republic of China] advanced computing ICs [integrated chips], including specific Huawei Ascend chips.
• Issuing guidance warning the public about the potential consequences of allowing US AI chips to be used for training and inference of Chinese AI models.
• Issuing guidance to US companies on how to protect supply chains against diversion tactics. 

As TelecomTV reported in late April, Huawei has been making significant strides with the development and production of its Ascend AI chips and while the Chinese vendor’s international, let alone domestic, influence is still limited, the US is clearly concerned that Huawei has what it takes to wrest business and influence away from US companies. 

In the meantime, US chip companies have the green light to strike big deals with Saudi outfits such as Humain. (It’s worth pointing out that Intel will clearly be very keen to get involved once it has made progress with its current reset.) Here’s what Humain’s partners have announced:

Nvidia: The AI tech giant is to provide several hundred thousand of its most advanced GPUs (graphics processing units) over the next five years. The first phase of deployment will be an AI supercomputer comprising 18,000 Nvidia GB300 Grace Blackwell processors and interconnected using Nvidia InfiniBand networking. Humain will also deploy Saudi’s first Nvidia Omniverse Cloud to “simulate and test physical AI solutions with digital twins”. In addition, Nvidia will supply the Saudi Data & AI Authority (SDAIA) with up to 5,000 Blackwell GPUs for a sovereign AI factory and enable smart city solutions, while Aramco Digital will “develop AI computing infrastructure, collaborate with Nvidia’s startup ecosystem, establish AI enterprise platforms, and create an engineering and robotics centre of excellence, including Nvidia platforms.” Read more. 

AMD: The US chip firm and Humain are to “invest up to $10bn to deploy 500 megawatts of AI compute capacity” over the next five years. Humain will “oversee end-to-end delivery, including hyperscale datacentre, sustainable power systems and global fibre interconnects, and AMD will provide the full spectrum of the AMD AI compute portfolio and the AMD ROCm open software ecosystem,” noted the chip firm. Read more.

Qualcomm Technologies: The wireless chip giant is set to enter into a “strategic collaboration” with Humain “for the development of next-generation AI datacentres, infrastructure and cloud-to-edge services to meet the rapidly growing demand for AI across the globe, including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.” The companies will “develop and build cutting-edge AI datacentres in Saudi Arabia designed to deliver highly efficient, scalable cloud-to-edge hybrid AI inferencing solutions for local and international customers based on Qualcomm Technologies’ edge and datacentre solutions [CPU and AI solutions]” and “accelerate the use of Humain’s AI cloud infrastructure by leveraging edge devices powered by Qualcomm Technologies’ Snapdragon and Dragonwing processors” with a view to integrating the ALLaM model to take “cloud-to-edge AI inferencing capabilities to a vast array of devices”. Humain and Qualcomm will also work with Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) “to establish a world-class Qualcomm Design Center in Saudi Arabia for semiconductor technology, supported with training and startup initiatives focused on building infrastructure and technology capabilities” in the country. Read more.  

Still with Qualcomm: It has struck a separate arrangement with Aramco Digital that will see the pair “develop, deploy and commercialise state-of-the-art edge AI industrial IoT [internet of things] technologies and solutions, which will drive the digital transformation of key industries in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The collaboration also covers the development of AI industrial use cases and service offerings.” Read more. 

Amazon Web Services (AWS): AWS and Humain plan to invest $5bn to build an AI zone in Saudi Arabia. “This first-of-a-kind AI Zone will bring together multiple innovative capabilities, including dedicated AWS AI infrastructure and servers with world-class semiconductors, UltraCluster networks for faster AI training and inference, AWS services like SageMaker and Bedrock, and AI application services such as Amazon Q to advance Saudi Arabia’s mission to be a world leader in AI.” AWS noted it has previously announced the construction of an AWS infrastructure region in Saudi Arabia that will become available in 2026 and in which it is investing $5.3bn: The new AI Zone announced with Humain is “an additional investment to grow global and local demand for advanced AI services in the Kingdom, and is part of AWS’s long-term commitment to bring its world-class infrastructure and services to Saudi Arabia.” Read more.

Cisco Systems: As part of a broader set of initiatives in the Middle East, Cisco has announced it is working with Humain to “build the world’s most open, scalable, resilient and cost-efficient AI infrastructure. This landmark collaboration will set a new standard for how AI infrastructure is designed, secured and delivered – combining Cisco’s global expertise with the Kingdom’s bold AI ambitions. The multi-year initiative aims to position the country as a global leader in digital innovation.” Read more. 

And in other news, Deutsche Telekom has reported a 6.5% year-on-year increase in first-quarter group revenues to €29.8bn (organic, like-for-like growth rate was 3.8%): Most of those sales comprised service revenues, which increased by 6.3% (3.5% organic) to €25bn. Adjusted EBITDA grew by 7.9% (5.3% organic) to €11.3bn. “Our figures speak a clear language: We remain on the right course,” stated Tim Höttges, CEO of Deutsche Telekom. “We are yet again proving our resilience in the face of a challenging environment.” DT has raised its financial guidance slightly for the full year, with adjusted EBITDA now expected to total around €45bn, up from the previous guidance of around €44.9bn. DT’s adjusted EBITDA in 2024 came to €43bn, so this year is set to be much improved. Read more. 

– The staff, TelecomTV