The Trump administration is clearing a path for two key Persian Gulf allies to pursue their artificial intelligence ambitions — and some of the biggest US tech companies are seizing on that opening with plans to spend billions of dollars in the region.

Under agreements with the US expected to be unveiled in coming days, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are poised to win wider access to advanced AI chips from Nvidia Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. that are considered the gold standard for running AI models.

The deals are taking shape while President Donald Trump visits the Middle East seeking to forge deeper business ties that put US technology initiatives at center stage. Even before any formal announcement of accords between the US and its partners, news began to emerge of American companies readying expanded projects in the region:

•Nvidia, the world’s biggest semiconductor maker, will supply its most advanced artificial intelligence-related chips to Saudi Arabia’s Humain, a company created to push that country’s AI infrastructure efforts. Humain will get “several hundred thousand” of Nvidia’s most advanced processors over the next five years, starting with 18,000 of its cutting-edge GB300 Grace Blackwell products and its InfiniBand networking technology.

•AMD, Nvidia’s nearest rival in AI accelerators, will provide chips and software for data centers “stretching from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the United States” in a $10 billion project, Humain and AMD said.

•Global AI, a US tech venture, also plans to collaborate with Humain, in an agreement expected to be worth billions of dollars, according to a person familiar with the matter. Founded by US tech industry veterans, Global AI intends to build a data center in New York that will rely on chips developed by Nvidia, with plans for more centers.

•Amazon.com Inc. and Humain said they would invest more than $5 billion to build an “AI zone” in Saudi Arabia. Among other projects, Humain would use technologies from the Amazon Web Services cloud unit to develop a marketplace of AI agents for use by Saudi Arabia’s government. AWS announced last year that it would open a cluster of data centers in Saudi Arabia, part of a $5.3 billion investment in the country.

•Cisco Systems Inc., the world’s largest provider of networking gear, is working with Humain as well. The company said it would be combining its “global expertise with the kingdom’s bold AI ambitions” to build infrastructure. It also extended a partnership with Abu Dhabi AI firm G42.

•Saudi Arabian venture capital firm STV launched a $100 million artificial intelligence fund with backing from Alphabet Inc.’s Google. The investments will be focused on early-stage startups in the Middle East and North Africa and support the development of infrastructure, according to a statement. It didn’t disclose the amount of capital put up by Google.

•The Trump administration is weighing a deal that would allow the UAE to import more than a million advanced Nvidia chips, people familiar with the matter said, a quantity that far exceeds limits under Biden-era AI chip regulations — and one that’s raised concerns that American hardware risks ending up in China’s hands. The deal, which is still being negotiated, would let the UAE import 500,000 of the most advanced chips each year from now to 2027, said the people. One-fifth would be set aside for G42, while the remainder would go to US companies building data centers in the Gulf nation, according to the people.

•OpenAI is considering building new data center capacity in the United Arab Emirates that could greatly expand its footprint in the Middle East, according to people familiar with the matter. The deal, which also isn’t yet final and could still change, may be announced in time for Trump’s visit to the UAE on Thursday. OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman is in the region too as part of a broader tour by tech leaders.

Those AI initiatives stood out in a flurry of investments unveiled on the first full day of Trump’s visit to the region. In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia’s capital, Trump was joined by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in hailing closer commercial relations. The deals also have included expanded purchases of Boeing Co. passenger jets and a promise by the kingdom to allow Elon Musk’s Starlink service to be used in aviation and maritime shipping.

To pave the way on artificial intelligence, the US moved formally Tuesday to rescind the so-called AI diffusion rule launched under President Joe Biden. The measure, which created three broad tiers of access for countries seeking AI chips, had faced intense opposition from companies like Nvidia and American allies over the constraints it placed on countries’ chip purchases. Trump administration officials are now drafting their own approach that is expected to shift toward negotiating individual deals with countries.

“The country that builds its partner ecosystem the fastest is the one that will win this high-stakes competition,” White House AI adviser David Sacks wrote on X following his meeting with Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan — the UAE’s national security adviser and brother of the country’s president. “Effective AI diplomacy is vital now more than ever.”

Even so, the Trump administration’s eagerness to lower barriers for allies like the UAE drew some objections from China hawks in Washington, who see a risk that Beijing could either acquire physical chips from the UAE or tap the capabilities of those semiconductors via the cloud.

Prospects of a UAE accord stirred warnings from a key lawmaker on the House Select Committee on China, which has long sounded the alarm about G42’s ties to Huawei Technologies Co. and other companies in China. “We raised concerns about G42 last year for this very reason — and we need safeguards in place before more agreements move forward,” Representative John Moolenaar, the top Republican on the panel, said in a post on X.

In a nod to those concerns over Huawei, the Commerce Department said as it revoked the AI diffusion rule that the US would consider use of the Chinese telecom equipment maker’s new Ascend chip a violation of American export controls.

—With assistance from Catherine Lucey, Matt Day and Yassmin Jabri.

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