The Scoop
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was expected to visit Abu Dhabi this weekend but called it off, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter, as the ChatGPT maker, which has deep ties to the UAE, prepares for its public market debut.
Uncertainty pervaded the potential visit, according to the person, with the region on edge over the war in Iran. Altman had planned to meet with executives from sovereign wealth fund Mubadala, AI conglomerate G42, AI investment fund MGX, and state oil company ADNOC, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter. MGX is an investor in OpenAI. It was unclear why he canceled.
OpenAI and Mubadala did not respond to a request for comment. G42 declined to comment.
Know More
While Wall Street executives have beat a trail to the UAE capital since the onset of the war, Silicon Valley leaders — who have been a major beneficiary of Gulf sovereign wealth funds’ largesse — have been less demonstrative. Still, Abu Dhabi is pouring billions into tech as it looks to beef up defense, maximize oil production, and automate more government services.
OpenAI is a major partner in these efforts as the UAE has deepened its US tech relationships under the Trump administration with a pledge to invest $1.4 trillion into the world’s largest economy over the next decade.
Altman’s planned trip had coincided with the disclosure this week that OpenAI filed initial paperwork to US regulators to become a public company, a process it has indicated it’s not rushing but could happen as soon as September. The IPO could value the company at up to $1 trillion, Reuters reported. Abu Dhabi’s MGX co-led OpenAI’s March funding round of $122 billion, setting the Silicon Valley record for largest amount raised, then valuing the ten year-old company at $852 billion. MGX is also invested in rival Anthropic and xAI, now folded into SpaceX.
Chipmaker Cerebras faced delays to its IPO due to significant ties to Abu Dhabi’s G42, which US regulators flagged as a potential national security concern, before going on to list on NASDAQ in May. It was the largest IPO of 2026, now expected to be unseated by SpaceX, which debuts today.
Step Back
Last year OpenAI chose Abu Dhabi as the first international location for its Stargate data center buildout, a 1-gigawatt center being built by G42’s Khazna and operated by OpenAI and Oracle, part of a broader 5-gigawatt UAE-US AI Campus with a $30 billion price tag.
Despite attacks on data centers in the region during the war, the UAE’s ambassador to the US said last month that the first 200 megawatts will come online “very soon.”
Notable
- Why the rush to Wall Street? Research shows IPOs tend to come in sector-specific waves and companies that list later don’t perform as well. Plus, even in a hot market, there’s only so much cash to go around, The Wall Street Journal reported.