Who’s Who In AI: A curated directory of influential builders, researchers, founders, engineers, investors, writers, and public figures shaping the future of artificial intelligence.
About This Directory
Artificial intelligence is evolving rapidly, driven by a relatively small group of individuals whose ideas, research, products, and companies influence the direction of the industry.
This directory serves as a practical reference guide for anyone seeking to understand the people behind today’s most important AI breakthroughs, businesses, platforms, and conversations.
Whether you’re researching industry leaders, discovering influential voices, following emerging startups, or simply learning who’s shaping the future of AI, this directory provides a structured place to begin.
Who’s Who in AI
Tareq Amin is a Jordanian-American technologist with over two decades of experience in technology and telecommunications. Before Humain, he served as CEO of Aramco Digital, driving digital transformation across Saudi Arabia, and prior to that launched Rakuten Symphony, aimed at converging IT and telecom networks.
In May 2025, Amin was appointed CEO of Humain — a full-stack AI company owned by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund and chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Within days of its launch, Humain had signed agreements with Nvidia, AMD, AWS, and Qualcomm totaling $23 billion, and by August had struck a deal with AI chip company Groq to serve OpenAI's open-weight models at high speed from Saudi data centers.
Humain's ambitions are sweeping. The company is building AI-native platforms across four integrated layers: AI Infrastructure, AI Cloud, Data and Models, and Applications and Solutions — with the goal of positioning Saudi Arabia as a sovereign player in global AI training and inference by 2030. A new joint venture between AMD, Cisco, and Humain will deploy up to 1 gigawatt of AI-optimized data center capacity, starting with 100MW in Saudi Arabia.
Amin's own framing is direct: "The world is hungry for capacity. You can take it slow — and we are definitely not taking it slow." TIME named him to its 100 Most Influential People in AI 2025 list.
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