Dec 18 (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia’s largest telecoms operator STC on Thursday announced a joint venture with the kingdom’s artificial intelligence company Humain to develop and operate data centres.
The companies signed a memorandum of understanding to establish the venture, in which Humain will hold a 51% stake, while STC will own 49%.
Saudi Arabia is seeking to accelerate its AI development to capitalise on the massive demand for computing power, as part of a broader effort to diversify away from oil revenues.
Humain, an AI company backed by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund PIF, has secured several agreements including deals with Elon Musk’s xAI and Blackstone-backed AirTrunk for data centre projects in the country, and is targeting a capacity of about 6 gigawatts by 2034.
The joint venture will aim to develop infrastructure capable of supporting operations with a required load of up to 1 gigawatt, beginning with an initial deployment of up to 250 megawatts.
(Reporting by Utkarsh Shetti in DubaiEditing by Tomasz Janowski)
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