Emirati billionaire to invest $20 billion in US data centers, Trump says

PALM BEACH, Florida (Reuters) – Emirati billionaire Hussain Sajwani promised a $20 billion investment in the booming U.S. data center industry in the coming years, he and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced on Tuesday at Trump’s home in Palm Beach, Florida.

With an election victory largely driven by voters’ economic concerns, Trump has doubled down on bolstering investments in domestic industries and proposed higher tariffs on Chinese goods as the U.S. tries to curb China’s access to the chips needed for advanced data centers.

“We’re planning to invest $20 billion and even more than that, if the opportunity in the market allows us,” said Sajwani, chairman of Dubai developer DAMAC, at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.

DAMAC owns the Middle East’s only Trump-branded golf course in Dubai, which opened in 2017, and the billionaire celebrated the New Year with Trump in Florida.

Trump has an affinity for announcements promising economic growth, though such investments do not always pan out. Early in his first term, he announced a $10 billion Foxconn (SS:) investment in a Wisconsin factory that promised thousands of jobs but was mostly abandoned.

Last month Trump and SoftBank (TYO:) Group CEO Masayoshi Son announced the Japanese tech investor would invest $100 billion in the U.S. over the next four years, focused around AI.

The introduction of OpenAI’s GenAI chatbot ChatGPT in late 2022 kicked off a wave of investment in generative AI technology and the pricey infrastructure required to support it, including power generation and transmission.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:) said last week it would spend about $80 billion this fiscal year to ramp up its AI capacity.

Restrictions on the export of coveted AI chips used in advanced data centers to China have tightened under the Biden administration, and Trump has nominated China hard-liners to key diplomatic and economic roles in his administration.