Saudi Arabia poised to become AI data center hub: Groq CEO at FII

Saudi Arabia is primed to become a hotspot for artificial intelligence infrastructure thanks to its surplus in energy, according to Groq CEO Jonathan Ross.

The Middle Eastern country is known for its vast energy resources and that’s leading major technology firms to announce infrastructure deals in the region. It is also part of the kingdom’s Vision 2030 strategy, which is a plan to diversify the Saudi Arabian economy beyond oil.

Jonathan Ross, the CEO of AI chip company Groq, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” in an exclusive interview from the Future Investment Initiative (FII) conference in Riyadh, that Saudi Arabia can become a net exporter of data thanks to its surplus in energy.

“One of the things that’s hard to export is energy. You have to move it, it’s physical, it costs money. Electricity, transporting it over transmission lines is very expensive,” he said.

Data, in comparison, “is very cheap to move,” he added. “So since there’s plenty of excess energy in the Kingdom, the idea is move the data here, put the compute here, do the computation for AI here, and send the results.”

“What you don’t want to do is build a data center right next to people, where it’s expensive for the land, or where the energy is already being used. You want to build it where there isn’t, where there aren’t too many people, where the energy is underutilized. And that’s the Middle East, so this is the ideal place to build out.”

The CEO added that the cost to run chips in Saudi Arabia is “actually cheaper than some of the Nordic countries,” which are known for their access to abundant low-cost renewable energy.