Capital as Code: How the UAE’s Sovereign Wealth Funds Are Engineering a Governance-Driven Tech Economy

The transformation of the United Arab Emirates from a hydrocarbon-dependent economy to a digitally diversified, innovation-led state has been neither incidental nor experimental, it has been profoundly architected. At the heart of this transformation lies the instrumental deployment of sovereign wealth funds (SWFs), which collectively manage over USD 2.49 trillion in assets, positioning the UAE as the third-largest holder of sovereign and public pension wealth globally. While these entities –  primarily Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), Mubadala Investment Company, and the Abu Dhabi Developmental Holding Company (ADQ), have long served as strategic economic stabilizers; their recent pivot into tech has redefined their mandate from wealth preservation to future-state creation.