Major AI Infrastructure Partnership: G42 & Cisco
On October 28, 2025, Cisco and G42 announced a major expansion of their collaboration to build a secure, end-to-end artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The announcement marks a significant step in the broader US-UAE technology agenda and signals a deepening of strategic technology alignment between the two nations.
What the partnership covers
Cisco will power, connect and secure a large-scale AI cluster being deployed by G42 in the UAE, which will incorporate advanced hardware and full-stack infrastructure components, including:
- Servers: Cisco UCS 885A equipped with AMD Instinct MI350X GPUs for compute acceleration.
- Networking: High-speed Cisco Nexus 9K 800G switches to support data-intensive AI workloads.
- Security & Compliance: Firewalls (Cisco Firepower 4200), observability and analytics tools, as well as the integration into G42’s “Regulated Technology Environment” (RTE) — a governance framework designed for AI sovereignty, trust and transparency.
- Optical, storage, management and automation layers: Cisco’s full-stack data-centre portfolio will be deployed to ensure performance, scalability and unified management.
Strategic context
- This collaboration builds on the broader U.S.–UAE AI Acceleration Partnership, which is designed to promote bilateral technology goals, including AI development, infrastructure and governance. The partnership identifies infrastructure as a strategic priority, beyond simply application-level adoption.
- According to Cisco’s internal AI research in the UAE: 92 % of organisations plan to deploy AI agents, 41 % expect those agents to work alongside employees within a year — yet only about 25 % of organisations currently have robust GPU capacity. The gap in compute/infrastructure capability is directly addressed by this agreement.
- The announcement connects with earlier flagship UAE projects such as the 1 GW “Stargate” AI cluster under construction, and the proposed 5 GW US-UAE AI technology campus (announced May 2025). These reflect the UAE’s push to become a global AI hub.
Why it matters
- For the UAE: This deals with more than just deploying AI apps — it’s about building sovereign, scalable, enterprise-grade AI infrastructure. It enables the UAE to host and manage advanced AI workloads locally while maintaining high standards of security, compliance and performance.
- For Cisco (and US-based tech providers): The partnership reinforces their role in the region’s digital transformation, positioning them as trusted providers of mission-critical infrastructure in regulated environments.
- For enterprises and investors: The deal signals that AI adoption is entering a new phase in the Middle East — one where infrastructure, governance and scale matter as much as algorithms. Companies in AI hardware, data-centre services, security, infrastructure automation and ed-tech should take notice.
- For the technology ecosystem: It demonstrates that AI is moving from isolated pilots into full-scale enterprise and national deployments — where stack integration, regulatory alignment and global supply-chain coordination become key constraints.
What to watch
- Regulatory & licensing progress: The announcement notes that deployment is subject to final U.S. and UAE regulatory clearances and export-licensing for certain technologies.
- Deployment milestones and scale-up: How quickly the AI cluster is brought online, and whether it achieves large-scale capacity (e.g., in the GW range) as planned.
- Ecosystem impact: Look for announcements of further partners, applications built on this infrastructure (in sectors such as healthcare, finance, energy, government), and regional roll-out beyond Abu Dhabi.
- Competitive ripple effects: Other regional players will likely accelerate their own AI infrastructure plans in response — potential for more deals, local supply-chain developments and talent-ecosystem growth.
