The United Arab Emirates has secured 15th place in the latest Global AI Competitiveness Index released by Deep Knowledge Group, ranking in the fields of artificial intelligence in biotechnology, healthcare, and longevity ahead of India, Australia, Spain, Belgium, and Finland. The index surveyed a global landscape of 8,000 companies, 4,200 investors, and 240 hubs contributing to the growth of artificial intelligence technologies across these sectors, with the UAE’s placement reflecting not its research output alone but its ability to translate artificial intelligence capability into deployable, regulated, and commercially viable biomedical systems.
Abu Dhabi secured 17th place among global city hubs, surpassing cities including Toronto and Seoul, on the strength of its advancements in healthcare digitization, governed artificial intelligence deployment, capital formation, and preventive health innovation. M42 serves as a particularly visible anchor across artificial intelligence, precision health, and genomics, while Malaffi provides a health information exchange foundation for more connected care, with Abu Dhabi increasingly functioning not merely as a site of healthcare demand but as a platform-building environment for governed biomedical artificial intelligence deployment, according to Dmitry Kaminskiy, General Partner of Deep Knowledge Group and co-author of the index. Dubai contributes to the national ranking through initiatives including NABIDH, Dubai Healthcare City, Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, and a commercially active private healthcare ecosystem that supports artificial intelligence-enabled health services, medical tourism, preventive health, and platform-based care.
The index makes an important distinction between generic artificial intelligence rankings and biomedical deployment readiness, a framework that works in the UAE’s favor. Unlike generic AI rankings, this edition focuses on whether countries and city hubs have the scientific infrastructure, healthcare digitization, governed data access, regulatory capacity, capital formation, talent, and clinical-commercial pathways required to convert AI capability into real-world biomedical value. Dr. Patrick Glauner, Professor of Artificial Intelligence at Deggendorf Institute of Technology in Germany and co-author of the report, said the future of artificial intelligence leadership will depend less on isolated research excellence and more on the capacity to operationalize innovation across healthcare systems, governance, and capital markets, an area where the UAE is progressing rapidly. The index also highlights the Middle East more broadly as one of the fastest-rising regions for artificial intelligence in healthcare and biotechnology, driven by strategic government investments, while noting that interoperability and data-sharing challenges remain constraints that the region will need to address as it moves further into the next phase of biomedical artificial intelligence deployment.
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