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NEOM Fund Invests $100 Million In Pony.ai Self-Driving Vehicles
The collaboration will help to develop advanced vehicles and smart infrastructure for NEOM and other regional markets.
The NEOM Investment Fund, a newly formed organization that works on behalf of Saudi Arabia’s mega-city NEOM, has invested $100 million in Pony.ai, a California-based autonomous vehicle solutions company.
As part of the investment, a joint partnership will be formed between NEOM and Pony.ai to develop, manufacture, and deliver self-driving autonomous vehicles and their required infrastructure.
The investment aligns with NEOM‘s plans to provide sustainable, hyperconnected transport across the $500 billion urban development, explained Majid Mufti, chief executive of the NIF, who said, “Pony.ai’s autonomous driving technology is already available today, and we are excited to be able to utilize it in NEOM in the near future,” he said.
Pony.ai’s expansion into NEOM isn’t the company’s first entry into the MENA region. Last week, the vehicle firm joined Abu Dhabi’s Smart and Autonomous Vehicles Industry, which will trial its latest technologies at the Yas Island testing zone.
NEOM is a vital part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 strategy, a major economic diversification program that hopes to shift the country’s reliance from the oil industry to technological developments. The NIF will focus on private sector investment and will directly fund solutions piloted and grown in NEOM, which could then be exported worldwide.
Also Read: Saudi Arabia Plans Digital Twins For 5 Cities, Including Mecca
The fund will also assume the role of portfolio manager for NEOM’s assets and companies, safeguarding returns for shareholders and investors and underpinning NEOM’s long-term financial sustainability.
The NIF’s strategy is designed to align NEOM’s objectives with those of institutional investors and innovators, “de-risking opportunities for them to participate in creating core global growth businesses and a thriving economy” in the new mega-city, Mr. Mufti explained.
News
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.
Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.
The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.
Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc
— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026
“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.
Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.
Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget
The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.
Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
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