LEAP 2026 brought a new series of U.S.-Saudi technology investments and partnerships, with more than $15 billion in technology investments and strategic commitments announced at the opening of the conference. Artificial intelligence, advanced computing, cloud infrastructure, and technology localization featured prominently, including several announcements involving U.S.-Saudi Business Council members.
Council Chairman’s Circle members HUMAIN and Qualcomm announced the Horizon Ultra AI PC, developed by HUMAIN with Qualcomm Technologies and powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X2 Elite platform. Qualcomm also expanded its presence in the Kingdom with a new engineering office in Riyadh. HUMAIN and Microsoft announced an enterprise AI productivity offering initially targeting one million users across the Middle East and Africa, while HUMAIN, Cisco, and AMD brought new AMD Instinct MI355X GPU infrastructure online in Saudi Arabia to provide AI computing capacity through HUMAIN’s GPU-as-a-service offering.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) confirmed that its first Saudi cloud region remains on track to launch in December 2026 and expanded its collaboration with HUMAIN on AI infrastructure in the Kingdom. HUMAIN also announced plans with U.S.-based Together AI for 55 MW of AI capacity and a new data center capable of scaling to 250 MW, while launching a Saudi AI cloud powered by NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra technology.
Adobe expanded its partnership with HUMAIN and the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT), including plans to provide more than 27 million eligible Saudi citizens and residents with one year of access to Adobe Firefly Standard and Adobe Express Premium features and to jointly develop an AI image-generation model tailored to Saudi cultural context. Adobe also announced that regional AI workloads will move onto HUMAIN’s AI computing infrastructure accelerated by Qualcomm.
Other announcements included xAI’s plans for its first data center expansion outside the United States and a HUMAIN and Applied Intuition partnership to develop an autonomous trucking network in Saudi Arabia. HP and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) announced initiatives supporting Saudi startups and locally produced technology infrastructure, while new programs involving ServiceNow, Google, Microsoft, and Intel will provide AI training and digital skills development to Saudi students, professionals, and other participants.
Together, the announcements reflect the expanding role of U.S. technology companies in Saudi Arabia’s rapidly developing AI and digital economy.
