What happened
A wholly-owned subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) was a named foreign backer in Megvii's US$750M Series D (8 May 2019), which lifted the facial-recognition firm's valuation to ~US$4B ahead of a planned IPO.
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InvestmentComputer VisionM&A / Investment2019AE-12
Megvii · United Arab Emirates
Middle East·Group: Megvii
How to read these numbers: A purposive, publicly sourced case library, not a probability sample: counts describe the library, not market share. Monetary figures mix investment, revenue and user metrics — treat them as magnitude markers and defer to the verbatim description and source link.
Structured fields
- Host country
- United Arab Emirates
- Region
- Middle East
- AI segment
- Computer Vision
- Entry mode
- M&A / Investment
- Entry year
- 2019
- Deployment status
- Investment
- Capital direction
- Gulf->China (inbound investment)
- Company group
- Megvii
Local partner
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority
Sovereign fundState-linked partner
Scale
US$750M Series D (ADIA one of several); ~US$4B valuation
Basis: company-disclosedMagnitude marker: ~750,000,000 USD
Monetary fields mix investment, revenue and user metrics. Treat them as magnitude markers only — never sum them across records; defer to the verbatim wording and source above.
Sources & notes
Record note: $750M Series D, ~$4B val, ADIA subsidiary among backers confirmed. Megvii later US-blacklisted.
Compiled from public reporting and company disclosures. Not legal or investment advice — cite the source link alongside any quotation.
Related records
Other records in the same host country or AI segment, ranked by source reliability and year.
SenseTime
United Arab Emirates·Middle East
Announced-concreteAE-02
Computer VisionR&D Centre2019
On 23 Jul 2019 SenseTime and the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) announced an agreement under which SenseTime would establish its EMEA regional R&D headquarters ('AI Centre of Excellence') in Abu Dhabi, targeting ~600 direct tech jobs over five years across healthcare, remote sensing and education. No source located to date confirms the centre was built or entered operation; SenseTime's own release describes an MOU signing ceremony and says establishment was 'expected to start in 2019'.