Technology

Cloud seeding did not cause the April 2024 UAE floods — the agency denied it and the physics rules it out. How the claim started, and how seeding really works.

Inside G42 — its nine operating companies, the Microsoft agreement and GPU licences, the Condor Galaxy supercomputers and the Jais Arabic models.

How Hub71 works in 2026: the Access Programme incentives, the ADGM licence requirement, the four Hub71+ ecosystems and how startups actually get selected.

Inside the Gulf space race 2026: the UAE's Mars Hope probe, Rashid lunar rovers and astronaut corps, plus Saudi Arabia's space agency and its economy.

A guide to Arabic AI models in 2026: Abu Dhabi's Falcon, G42's Jais, Saudi Arabia's ALLaM and Qatar's Fanar, and why the Gulf is building sovereign LLMs.

The GCC data centre boom in 2026 tracks 170+ projects worth over USD 93 billion, as AWS, Microsoft, Google and Oracle race into the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

GCC data-protection and cybersecurity laws 2026: UAE PDPL, Saudi PDPL and NCA ECC-2, plus Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and Kuwait rules — and how businesses stay compliant.

A potential SpaceX IPO is generating sustained Gulf sovereign fund attention because Starlink — the world's most commercially advanced satellite internet constellation — represents the connectivity layer that is conspicuously absent from portfolios that already cover AI models, chips, and data centre infrastructure.

Two June 2026 UAE deals signal the maturation of Gulf AI from experimentation to consolidation: CNTXT AI acquired dialect-aware Arabic voice AI startup Actualize for enterprise GCC deployment, while du launched a $50 million corporate venture fund targeting fintech, AI, and cybersecurity.

Bahrain FinTech Bay has evolved into the GCC's most advanced fintech ecosystem, built on the region's first regulatory sandbox (2017), first open banking framework (2018), and a unified Central Bank of Bahrain that has consistently moved faster than larger Gulf counterparts on emerging financial technology regulation.

Dubai International Financial Centre has announced plans to become the world's first AI-native financial centre — embedding AI into its legal frameworks, regulatory processes, and physical infrastructure. For the 6,500-plus companies in DIFC, the shift means AI-assisted compliance, regulatory sandboxes, and smart campus infrastructure.

UAE infrastructure faces 90,000 to 200,000 cyber breach attempts daily in 2026, with 128 confirmed incidents recorded year-to-date. The Government Cybersecurity Summit, held at Conrad Etihad Towers in Abu Dhabi on June 9, brought 400-plus leaders together to coordinate the GCC's digital defence response.