Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan

Spear’s Review

Even by the standards of the Gulf, the rapid rise of Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan – the Abu Dhabi security chief turned trillion-dollar money man – has been remarkable.

One of 19 sons of UAE founder Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan, the sheikh was officially confirmed as Abu Dhabi’s deputy ruler in 2023, shortly after his brother, Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, became the UAE’s third president. However, the most important source of Sheikh Tahnoon’s power is his brother’s decision to bestow upon him a much more modern position: control over Abu Dhabi’s gargantuan sovereign wealth fund.

With more than $1 trillion under management, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) ranks among the largest state-owned funds in the world. By some estimates it has now eclipsed neighbouring Saudi Arabia’s. 

As well as overseeing the ADIA, Sheikh Tahnoon also chairs a number of other financial institutions, including the UAE’s largest bank (First Abu Dhabi Bank), the biggest entity on the Abu Dhabi bourse (International Holding Company) and the state-run AI venture known as Group 42 (G42). Such unprecedented influence over one of the Middle East’s largest capital markets would be a story in its own right. Yet Sheikh Tahnoon has done something interesting with his positions, harnessing them to further the UAE’s ambition to become an active player, rather than just a major investor, in the AI revolution.

Initial signs are promising. G42 is already partnering with OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, to build a new UAE-based supercomputer, enabled, in no small part, by the clusters of data centres popping up across the Emirates. The chief executive of the $3 trillion chipmaker Nvidia, Jensen Huang, has also been spotted on a visit to Abu Dhabi.

In April came the news that G42 would receive a $1.5 billion investment from Microsoft – the clearest sign yet that Silicon Valley regards Abu Dhabi as a regional partner. The deal was announced with a photo of a grinning Sheikh Tahnoon standing behind Microsoft president Brad Smith and G42’s chief executive Peng Xiao as they sat signing papers. Was it a deliberate move to have the sheikh hovering over them in such a power position?