DUBAI, Nov 5 (Reuters) - Microsoft ( MSFT ) and Abu

Dhabi's G42 on Wednesday announced a 200-megawatt expansion of

data centre capacity in the United Arab Emirates as part of an

over $15 billion investment commitment by the U.S. tech giant in

the Gulf country.

The expansion will be delivered through Khazna Data Centers,

a unit of G42, and it is expected to start coming online before

the end of next year, the two firms said in a joint statement,

without providing further details.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) said this week its investment in the UAE will

reach $7.3 billion between 2023 and the end of this year, with a

further $7.9 billion earmarked for 2026-2029.

It also announced that President Donald Trump's

administration had approved the export of advanced Nvidia ( NVDA )

chips for its data centres in the Gulf country, which

has been spending billions of dollars to become a global AI hub.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) invested $1.5 billion last year to take a minority

stake in G42, which is also backed by private equity firm Silver

Lake, Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala, and the family

office of billionaire investor Ray Dalio.

The expansion will provide further AI and cloud

infrastructure to the UAE, "strengthening Microsoft Azure's

secure, scalable, and sovereign cloud services," the two firms

said on Wednesday.