𝐇𝐮𝐚𝐰𝐞𝐢 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐝𝐝𝐥𝐞 𝐄𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐍𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡 𝐀𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚 𝐛𝐲 𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐮𝐝 𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐚𝐮𝐝𝐢 𝐜𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐑𝐢𝐲𝐚𝐝𝐡.

Huawei Technologies has opened a cloud data center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as part of its high-tech strategy to expand its presence in the Middle East and North Africa. The building will facilitate government operations and artificial intelligence applications, including Arabic language models. Huawei Cloud Services, which offers cutting-edge cloud-based IT, database, big data, and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions, will use this data center as a key regional hub. Huawei’s regional president, Steven Yi, has said that the hub will serve as a port of entry for other Chinese companies into the Saudi market. Saudi Arabia’s vice minister of communications and information technology, Haitham bin Abdul Rahman Al-Ohali, recently gave Huawei high praise for its contributions to and impact on the country’s burgeoning tech industry. The United States has warned its Middle Eastern partners not to do business with Huawei because of the company’s alleged involvement in monitoring initiatives targeting Uyghur Muslims and because of claims of intellectual property theft. Huawei plans to spend $400 million on cloud-related projects in Saudi Arabia over the next five years. They want to launch the Huawei Cloud Startup Program, offer developer education to 200,000 people, and work with 1,000 regional partners to create cloud-based products and services.