MGX mulls major investment in Anthropic’s $20B funding round

Abu Dhabi-backed investment firm MGX may be close to putting hundreds of millions of dollars into AI startup Anthropic as part of a massive fundraising round expected to top $20 billion.

The round, which would value Anthropic at about $350 billion, has attracted major support from Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC and other large institutional backers, Bloomberg reports.

MGX was set up last year with support from Abu Dhabi funds including Mubadala and technology group G42, with a mandate to invest heavily in artificial intelligence and related infrastructure.

The firm has already taken stakes in OpenAI and Elon Musk’s xAI.

KKR to invest in Gulf Data Hub’s seven branches across region

KKR plans to invest in Gulf Data Hub, one of the largest independent data center platforms in the Middle East, amid skyrocketing global data consumption driven by AI and cryptocurrencies.

The announcement will make the global investment firm a major player in the regional data storage market, as GDH owns a portfolio of seven state-of-the-art data centers in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and additional facilities planned in Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman, Bloomberg reports.

Prior investments by KKR in the region include a strategic partnership with ADNOC to create ADNOC Oil Pipelines.

The fund also acquired a commercial aircraft portfolio from Etihad Airways in 2020 through Altitude Aircraft Leasing.

$1.2 trillion Nuveen opens shop at Abu Dhabi Global Market

Nuveen is the second trillion-dollar investment firm to open shop this month at Abu Dhabi Global Market.

Prior to Nuveen, which manages $1.2 trillion in assets, Prudential Financial’s PGIM, with $1.3 trillion under management, also opened an office in the UAE capital in September.

Nuveen CEO William Huffman told The National, that his firm, which holds the assets of the U.S. teachers’ pension fund TIAA, offers the Middle East market “forward-looking opportunities including infrastructure, renewable energy and real estate technology.”

He said that “based on our conversations with investors, we believe… our reputation … aligns closely with the needs of clients in the region.”