India, UAE map out frameworks for cooperation in defense, tech, energy

India and the UAE are pulling defense, energy, and AI ties closer together. The two countries signed a series of agreements during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Abu Dhabi spanning defense, advanced computing, energy, and logistics, Randhir Jaiswal, spokesperson for India’s External Affairs Ministry, said on X.

The defense angle: The two sides agreed to a framework for a strategic defense partnership expected to deepen industrial collaboration, technology sharing, innovation cooperation, and regional security coordination, though few additional details were disclosed.

Part of a much bigger push: The agreements land as defense becomes an increasingly urgent national priority for the UAE following recent regional strikes and disruption that forced the country to rethink parts of its defense and supply-chain resilience strategy. Analysts previously told us that the UAE is increasingly focused on localization and on managing more of the end-to-end defense supply chain, with Emirati players shifting more capital toward defense manufacturing and strategic capabilities.

What does India bring to the table?

India has developed cost-competitive manufacturing capacity and a growing tech ecosystem to match. India's defense industrial base has expanded significantly under the “Make in India” initiative, producing everything from missiles and artillery to naval vessels at price points well below Western alternatives.

It has also developed indigenous capabilities in drones, radar systems, electronic warfare, and missile technology. The BrahMos cruise missile (a Russian-Indian joint venture) is already a proven export product.

India can also absorb large production orders and has a deep pool of engineers and technicians — useful for the UAE as it looks to localize manufacturing without building every capability from scratch.

And on the AI front

The visit also helped the UAE-India supercomputing partnership move ahead with commercial terms agreed on G42 and Cerebras’ project to build a national-scale supercomputer initiative featuring eight exaflops of compute capacity, aimed at strengthening local AI infrastructure and data sovereignty.

Sovereign AI gathers steam: The cluster plans to serve as a foundational asset for India’s sovereign AI ambitions, with state-run Center for Development of Advanced Computing leading deployment and operations alongside Abu Dhabi-backed AI powerhouse G42. The infrastructure will anchor joint research across genomics, energy, and geospatial analytics.

Why it matters: At 8 exaflops, the cluster is roughly 19 times more powerful than India’s entire existing national AI computing capacity combined. Unlike recent multi-bn-USD investment announcements by US hyperscalers like Google and Microsoft, which build local data centers primarily for global cloud consumption, this deployment is structured strictly as sovereign infrastructure. Operated under Indian governance frameworks, the computing capacity will be walled inside the country, specifically to feed domestic researchers and startups.

Securing the energy matrix

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) also inked two strategic pacts with Indian state energy firms to scale up energy partnership between the two countries, as per a press release.

The first pact with Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves, which manages India’s emergency crude reserves, could potentially expand Adnoc’s storage capacity to up to 30 mn barrels at its facilities across India. Conversely, it also looks at storing Indian strategic crude reserves in Fujairah alongside LNG and LPG storage facilities.

A second agreement with Indian Oil Corporation, one of India’s largest oil refiners and fuel retailers, focuses on scaling LPG supply and trading with India. Building on a supply agreement signed in 2023, the new pact will expand India’s gas purchases from Adnoc alongside the integration of supply and shipping infrastructure between the two companies.

Why it matters:By holding massive physical reserves on both sides of the Arabian Sea, both players are building a buffer against supply network disruptions like those seen during the Israel-US-Iran war.

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