We present a snapshot of a Vision of the Future on Our World courtesy the team at the National of the UAE, Fortune Magazine, the Information, and a Focus on AI:
UAE punches above its weight in AI
A new report gives UAE cities high marks for AI readiness. Khushnum Bhandari / The National
In brief | A recent series of news items has shown the UAE's pursuit of being an AI leader has started to bear fruit.
According to a report from Counterpoint Research, Dubai now ranks in the top five world cities in terms of adoption of artificial intelligence, ahead of San Francisco, widely considered to be the birthplace of the modern technology industry.
Abu Dhabi secured the number eight spot, just ahead of New York City.
Given the rankings of both UAE cities, perhaps it is no surprise that US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, who also serves chairman of America’s Energy Dominance Council, has praised Washington's relationship with the UAE in artificial intelligence.
Quoted | "The city [Dubai] has an AI strategist in every government department. All teachers are now being given AI training and they have a programme to train one million AI engineers. They are clearly investing in the future and Abu Dhabi is not far behind"
– Marc Einstein, research director at Counterpoint
Future in focus
Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang speaks to journalists in Beijing. AFP
The UAE has launched 'advertiser permits' for social media users
Anyone displaying promotional content on their social media channels is to be required to apply for a licence, the UAE Media Council has announced. The advertiser permit will be needed whether the content is paid for or not.
This is a signal: Social media advertising is the new normal. It has become more ubiquitous than billboards and TV adverts, so the push to require permits makes complete sense. Because social media platforms are often used by people of all ages, the need for disclosure about motives for what is being posted becomes paramount. Users deserve to know whether someone has a financial interest behind the content they share. In turn, the UAE's decision to launch advertiser permits is a step in the right direction and probably ahead of the curve to some extent.
Figma CEO Dylan Field with CFO Praveer Melwani during the company's IPO on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on July 31, 2025.Michael Nagle/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Figma, the design software company led by CEO and cofounder Dylan Field, saw its stock price more than triple in a stunning debut on the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday.
Shares of Figma were trading as high as $107 within minutes after it began trading under the ticker FIG. The company and its early shareholders raised $1.2 billion in its IPO on Wednesday, with shares priced at $33.
The stock began trading Thursday at $85 a share, and took off like a rocket from there.
The surge gave Figma a market cap of roughly $46 billion, eclipsing the $20 billion price that Adobe had planned to acquire the company for before the merger was abandoned in 2023 due to regulatory pushback.
Adobe, with a market cap of around $152 billion, will now be Figma’s key public markets competitor as the upstart chases market share.
Praveer Melwani, Figma’s CFO, told Fortune on Thursday morning that it will be business as usual for Figma moving forward, with possible acquisitions in the pipeline.
Figma’s securities filing for its public debut showed a growing, profitable business, with revenue up in Q1 2025, 46% year-over-year to $228.2 million, and a net income for the quarter at $44.8 million.
Figma’s opening pop reflects not only optimism about Figma, but optimism about the venture-backed IPO landscape overall.
Muted in recent years, tech IPOs have been in the midst of a slow but decisive recovery. Recently, VC-backed darlings like Circle, Chime, Hinge Health, and CoreWeave have all gone public, with varying degrees of success. —Allie Garfinkle
Apple sets quarterly revenue record, beating expectations
Apple blew past Wall Street expectations with its third-quarter earnings report released Thursday.
Its results revealed robust growth driven by persistent iPhone demand, surging services revenue, and resilience in key international markets—even as tariff anxieties and questions over its AI roadmap loomed over the industry.
For the quarter ended June 28, 2025, Apple posted revenue of $94 billion, representing a 10% increase compared to the same period last year.
Net income soared to $1.57 per share—up 12% from a year ago and significantly ahead of analyst forecasts, which had pegged earnings per share at $1.43 on expected revenue of $89.22 billion.
Apple shares climbed more than 2.5% post-market on the results.
The iPhone business was the principal engine of growth, generating $44.6 billion in sales—up from $39.2 billion the previous year.
The Services segment, encompassing the App Store, Apple Pay, Apple TV+, Apple Music, and iCloud, also set a new record: Revenue there hit $27.4 billion, a 13% increase over last year.
Mac sales also posted double-digit growth, rising to $8 billion. In contrast, iPad and Wearables revenue both saw modest declines.
Apple notably outperformed expectations in China with $15.4 billion in sales. The company had projected a $900 million headwind from tariffs this quarter. —Nick Lichtenberg
Microsoft climbs to $4 trillion market cap on blowout earnings
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in Seattle on May 19, 2025.Jason Redmond/AFP/Getty Images
Microsoft delivered a blockbuster quarter to close its 2025 fiscal year, riding the wave of surging demand for cloud and AI services and sending its stock to new heights in after-hours trading.
For the quarter ended June 30, 2025, Microsoft reported revenue of $76.4 billion, an 18% jump over the previous year. Net income climbed even more swiftly, up 24% to $27.2 billion. Earnings per share reached $3.65, outpacing analyst estimates of $3.37.
“In our largest quarter of the year,” CEO Satya Nadella told analysts on the subsequent earnings call, “we significantly exceeded expectations.”
Investors responded decisively to the upbeat results and bullish AI outlook.
Microsoft’s shares spiked over 7% in after-hours trading, pushing the stock toward record highs and lifting Microsoft’s market capitalization past the $4 trillion mark—cementing its place as one of just two companies to reach that level globally, along with Nvidia.
The reaction underscored Wall Street’s confidence in Microsoft’s strategy, particularly its aggressive investments in cloud infrastructure and its push to commercialize AI tools such as Copilot across its productivity and developer platforms.
The company’s Intelligent Cloud segment—home to Azure—generated $29.9 billion in revenue, up a robust 26%. Azure and other cloud services revenue soared 39% for the quarter, while annual Azure revenue surpassed $75 billion, growing 34% year over year.
The Productivity and Business Processes segment, anchored by Microsoft 365 and LinkedIn, generated $33.1 billion (up 16%), and More Personal Computing brought in $13.5 billion (up 9%), bolstered by a rebound in device demand and rising Xbox content revenue. —Nick Lichtenberg
Meta promises ‘personal superintelligence’ for all
Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg expects to deliver “personal superintelligence for everyone,” but his ambitious bets on AI are affecting the company’s cash flows and are likely to hit expenses even harder as Meta soups up its AI capabilities and continues its hiring spree.
The social media giant said it spent $17 billion on capital expenditures during its fiscal second quarter, mostly on AI infrastructure and data centers, and it expects to continue to spend heavily through 2026.
Revenue cruised 22% higher to $47.5 billion, and its core advertising business generated $46.6 billion in ad revenue across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. Daily active users grew to 3.5 billion people and profit margins improved, with net income rising 36% to $18.3 billion compared to last year.
“The intersection of technology and culture is where Meta focuses,” said Zuckerberg in an Instagram reel defining Meta’s aims for superintelligence. The new lab will focus on developing the next generation of Meta’s models, he said.
Zuckerberg said the company is building an “elite, talent-dense team,” led by one of the world’s youngest billionaires, Alexandr Wang. The new superintelligence team will have access to “unparalleled compute” as Meta builds out new gigawatt+ clusters.
“We’re making all these investments because we have conviction that superintelligence is going to improve every aspect of what we do,” Zuckerberg said. —Amanda Gerut
How AI helped deliver 42,000 patient treatments
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center launched an AI-powered platform called CS Connect to streamline virtual care, using technology developed with K Health.
Before the rollout, physicians were stretched thin, balancing patient care with time-consuming intake and paperwork.
Tthe AI handles symptom checks, treatment recommendations, and follow-up messaging, freeing doctors to focus on in-person care.
In a recent study, 77% of AI-generated treatment plans were rated optimal (compared to just 67% from physicians) while the platform has already managed over 42,000 patient interactions.
