Mapping AI governance where the capital is moving.
A regional research and convening initiative for responsible AI across the Middle East.
The region is building faster than it is documenting.
The Middle East is now one of the largest sources of sovereign AI capital in the world, and one of the least mapped in governance terms. National AI strategies exist across the Gulf and the Levant. What does not exist, in any comparable form, is a published account of how those strategies translate into operating rules — procurement standards, data residency practice, workforce literacy obligations, redress mechanisms.
ATLAS is a mapping exercise before it is anything else. The working assumption is that the region does not need imported European frameworks restated; it needs its own arrangements described accurately enough that they can be compared, argued with, and improved.
Three workstreams.
Atlas
A comparative map of national AI strategies, supervisory bodies, and binding instruments across the region — sourced from primary documents, in Arabic and English, with provenance recorded for each entry.
Convening
Closed working sessions bringing regional regulators, operators, and researchers to the same table with Nordic and US counterparts. Named voices, published agenda.
Literacy
Adaptation of the AI for Norway curriculum method to Arabic-language public-sector audiences, subject to a partner institution in-region.
In development.
Scoped, not yet dated beyond the scoping note. ATLAS does not launch without a named in-region research partner.
Next milestone — scoping note published: Q4 2026
Following — first comparative map release: H2 2027
We are speaking with research institutions, regulators, and funders across the region ahead of the scoping note. Enquiries go through the contact desk.