From German data centres to Italian AI infrastructure and a new satellite project with France, Emirati capital is moving deeper into the technologies and industries Europe sees as strategically important.
The United Arab Emirates’ plan to invest an additional €40 billion in Germany is significant by almost any measure. Announced on September 10 during President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s historic state visit to Berlin, the commitment will target industry, advanced technology, artificial intelligence, digital infrastructure and energy, with €10 billion earmarked specifically for Bavaria. German officials have said part of the investment could support data centres with capacity of up to one gigawatt.
The announcement is a substantial boost to the German economy, but also part of a broader story across Europe.
Over the past several years, the UAE has been steadily expanding its economic relationships with some of Europe’s largest economies. What stands out is not simply the volume of capital being discussed, but where it is going: artificial intelligence, data centres, advanced manufacturing, clean energy, space technology and other strategic infrastructure increasingly sit at the centre of these partnerships.
Germany is the latest — and one of the largest — examples of that shift.
Capital is moving towards the new economy
The pattern is clearest when the German announcement is placed alongside recent developments in Italy and France.
During Sheikh Mohamed’s state visit to Italy in February 2025, the UAE announced a $40 billion investment commitment spanning a broad range of sectors. More than 40 agreements accompanied the visit, covering areas including energy, advanced manufacturing, high-tech industry, artificial intelligence, digital infrastructure, space and defence. The two countries also established a strategic partnership on AI and data centres involving Italian energy group Eni and UAE-based MGX and G42.
Some of that ambition is now beginning to turn into identifiable projects. The UAE-backed Khazna is planning a data centre in Lombardy, while Italian and Emirati officials have continued to use their investment partnership to explore cooperation in technology, energy and other future-oriented sectors.
France provides an even clearer example of how Emirati investment is moving into frontier technology. An AI cooperation agreement reached in 2025 envisaged between €30 billion and €50 billion of investment in data-centre infrastructure. Le Monde has since described the UAE as an increasingly important source of funding for French technology companies.
This week brought another striking example. UAE-based Marlan Space and Franco-American company Loft Orbital announced a $1 billion programme to build a 50-satellite constellation incorporating artificial intelligence, with French AI company Mistral among the technology partners. The satellites will process information in orbit and are intended for applications ranging from wildfire detection and disaster response to maritime monitoring and the protection of critical infrastructure.
Crucially, this is not simply an Emirati investor financing a French technology project. The satellites will be manufactured at Orbitworks in Abu Dhabi, pairing European and international technology with new industrial capability being built in the UAE.
That detail says a great deal about the model now emerging.
More than a portfolio of European assets
Gulf investment in Europe is hardly new. Sovereign wealth and private capital from the region have long been significant investors in European companies, property and infrastructure.
What is changing is the strategic context around those investments.
The technologies attracting Emirati capital today are increasingly the same ones that European governments regard as essential to economic sovereignty and future competitiveness. AI computing capacity, energy infrastructure, advanced industrial production, semiconductors, cybersecurity and space systems are no longer niche technology sectors. They underpin everything from industrial productivity to defence and energy security.
For the UAE, they are equally important to a long-term effort to build an economy less dependent on hydrocarbons.
That creates a different logic from conventional portfolio investment. The goal is not necessarily just to own valuable European assets, but to build relationships through which capital, technology, industrial expertise and market access move in both directions.
The French satellite project illustrates this unusually well. Marlan Space’s chief executive described its purpose as helping turn the UAE “from a buyer to a seller of satellite services”, while retaining engineering skills, intellectual property and supply-chain capacity in the country.
The same logic can be seen in the Italian partnership, where the two countries have explicitly linked investment to cooperation in AI, data centres, advanced technologies and manufacturing. Italy and the UAE have also described their respective positions as logistics hubs connecting Europe with faster-growing markets further east.
The latest announcements in Germany now add a particularly powerful industrial dimension.
Why Germany matters to the European strategy
Germany offers something different from either France or Italy: the depth of Europe’s largest industrial base. Its engineering companies, manufacturers, research institutes and highly specialised suppliers make it an attractive partner for an investor seeking exposure not simply to European demand, but to the technologies embedded in physical industry.
The new €40 billion commitment reflects that. Its stated focus on advanced technology, AI, digital infrastructure, industry and energy places it firmly within the wider pattern of UAE investment in sectors likely to shape the next phase of European economic development.
Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, the UAE’s Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, described the approach succinctly during the state visit: “The UAE invests for the long term and builds partnerships that endure.”
The important word may be partnerships.
Europe needs very large amounts of capital if it is to modernise industry, expand computing capacity, decarbonise energy systems and remain competitive in emerging technologies. The UAE, meanwhile, wants more than financial returns from its global investment activity. Its economic strategy increasingly seeks to acquire expertise, build domestic capabilities and connect Emirati companies with international technology and markets.
Those interests will not align automatically in every project, but the scale of recent agreements suggests that European capitals increasingly see the UAE as a source both of capital investment and of strategic economic partnership.
There is also a wider institutional opportunity. The UAE and European Union are pursuing closer trade and investment relations, while bilateral ties with major member states are deepening in parallel. Germany itself supports efforts towards a broader EU-UAE trade agreement.
The €40 billion announced in Berlin should therefore be understood in that European context—and as part of a clear direction of travel. The UAE is becoming more deeply embedded in Europe’s industrial and technological transformation at precisely the moment it is pursuing a transformation of its own economy. Increasingly, the bargain is not simply European expertise in exchange for Gulf capital. It is an attempt to build technology, infrastructure and commercial capacity on both sides.
The announcements made during Sheikh Mohamed’s state visit to Berlin, therefore, are yet another important sign that the relationship between Europe and the Gulf is being rebuilt around what both sides expect the next economy to require — capital, energy, technology and the ability to turn all three into industries that can scale.
