Humain invests $3B in Elon Musk’s xAI, becomes SpaceX shareholder

Saudi Arabia just wrote one of the biggest AI checks of the year. Humain, the kingdom’s state-backed artificial intelligence company, said Wednesday it invested $3 billion in xAI as part of the company’s Series E round — just before SpaceX moved to acquire the startup in a sweeping consolidation.

The investment gives Humain a significant minority stake. Its xAI shares were converted into SpaceX equity following the acquisition, effectively turning the Saudi-backed AI company into a shareholder in Musk’s space empire.

“HUMAIN, a PIF company delivering full-stack artificial intelligence capabilities globally, today announced a $3 billion strategic investment in xAI as part of the company’s Series E financing round,” Human said in a news release.

That’s more than a financial transaction. It’s a strategic alignment between one of the world’s most capitalized AI builders and a country racing to reposition itself for a post-oil economy.

The move lands weeks after Humain secured a financing agreement of up to $1.2 billion from Saudi Arabia’s National Infrastructure Fund. The deal outlines non-binding terms to build up to 250 megawatts of data center capacity — the kind of infrastructure that separates AI ambitions from AI reality. Training and deploying frontier models is less about flashy demos and more about sustained access to compute.

From Oil to AI: Saudi Arabia’s Humain Invests $3B in Elon Musk’s xAI

Saudi Arabia has made it clear it wants to compete in that infrastructure race. Demand for GPUs, high-density data centers, and energy-hungry AI clusters is climbing. Countries with capital and energy are positioning themselves as future compute hubs.

This investment deepens a relationship first announced in November at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum, where Humain and xAI said they would jointly develop 500 megawatts of AI data center infrastructure. That scale signals long-term intent, not experimentation.

“The investment builds on the partnership announced between Humain and xAI in November at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum where both firms said they would jointly develop 500 megawatts of AI data center infrastructure,” Reuters reported.

In January, xAI disclosed that it raised $20 billion in an upsized Series E round as the company pushes new models and expands its infrastructure footprint to compete with OpenAI and Anthropic. A month later, Musk folded xAI into SpaceX, combining artificial intelligence research with one of the world’s most ambitious aerospace companies.

For Musk, the consolidation tightens control over talent, capital, and compute. For Saudi Arabia, the stake offers exposure to frontier AI development and ownership inside a company that sits at the intersection of space, data, and defense-adjacent technologies.

Humain isn’t limiting itself to infrastructure deals. In October, the company revealed plans for “Humain 1,” a voice-controlled operating system that lets users talk to their computers rather than click through menus. Think less mouse, more conversation. The pitch is simple: computing should feel natural.

The larger picture is hard to miss. Saudi Arabia is channeling billions into artificial intelligence, data centers, and digital systems as it pushes to diversify beyond hydrocarbons. Capital is flowing into compute-heavy assets, long-duration projects, and global partnerships.

The Humain-xAI deal ties that national strategy directly to Musk’s AI and space ambitions. And with the shares now held by SpaceX, Saudi Arabia isn’t just funding AI — it owns a stake in one of the world’s most tightly integrated technology empires.