Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Vice President, Deputy Prime Minister and Chairman of the Presidential Court, witnessed the launch of an etisalat project to develop and expand digital infrastructure capacity in the UAE and abroad, etisalat said. He was briefed on the group's plans in his role as chairman of the Emirates Investment Authority, the main shareholder in etisalat group. The project includes plans to expand international connectivity capacity to more than 500 terabits per second by 2030, more than 25 times the current capacity, and to develop diverse routes intended to improve connectivity efficiency, reliability and low-latency performance.
Sheikh Mansour said investing in digital infrastructure is a pillar for supporting emerging technologies and enabling a knowledge-based, innovation-driven economy. He stressed coordinated national efforts and the role of national institutions in advancing the UAE's AI ambitions and digital economy. He said the UAE continues to invest in advanced digital infrastructure, with AI as a central pillar of its development path, and that the country aims to contribute to creating and developing technologies rather than only keeping pace with them.
Jassem Mohamed Bu Ataba Alzaabi, chairman of etisalat group, said the project reflects a conviction that the UAE should govern and build with AI, not only adopt it, and that this requires digital infrastructure at scale. He said moving international connectivity from 20 Tbps to more than 500 Tbps is a step to address challenges in global data processing and data flow amid AI advances, and to improve flexibility and reliability for UAE AI campuses, global cloud providers, and the group's operations and customers. He said the project is designed with diversified routes and low latency to keep the country's connection to the global digital economy fast, direct and resilient, and to ensure the UAE's digital sovereignty.
Sheikh Mansour also witnessed the launch of etisalat's 50th anniversary celebrations and the group's new vision to become an AI-powered and enabling telco under the etisalat name. The project is the group's first major commitment under a new strategy built around four business engines: telco, AI and business solutions, infrastructure, and fintech. etisalat group said it operates in 38 countries and serves more than 250 million subscribers, which it said gives the project reach beyond the UAE. The project supports the UAE's ambition to become a global hub for advanced technology and AI, according to etisalat.
