Duke Convenes Global Leaders in Abu Dhabi to Pursue AI’s Next Evolution

Since its inception in 2021, the National Science Foundation (NSF) AI Institute for Edge Computing Leveraging Next Generation Networks (Athena) has frequently served as a hub for industry, government and academic leaders to gather and discuss the latest innovations in edge AI.

The institute is focused on advancing edge computing, a concept that aims to bring AI closer to where data originates on local devices as opposed to cloud-based servers. Combining edge computing and AI also enhances the ability to gather data from the physical world since it can process data in real-time. Evolutions in edge AI could enable vast applications such as autonomous drones or real-time language translation.

In early February, Duke Engineering took that conversation to the global stage, as Athena convened an invite‑only summit in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that welcomed many of the world’s most influential thinkers in artificial intelligence, computing systems and hardware.

Hosted in partnership with the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), the Abu Dhabi AI Summit gathered about 150 luminaries, including 19 members from the National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences, as well as senior executives from the world’s biggest tech companies, venture capitalists with billions already invested and prominent AI researchers from around the world.

Funded by the NSF and Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Athena brings together a multidisciplinary team of scientists and engineers from 11 universities worldwide, led by Duke, who collaborate on research, broadening participation in AI, and education and workforce development for the future.

The goal of this summit was not only to showcase new demos and research findings; it also focused on a deeper question: What foundations and collaborations must be in place for edge AI to scale and operate reliably, where decisions happen in real time close to people, infrastructure and the physical world?

“One takeaway from the summit is that reaching the full potential of AI will require more than technological advancements,” said Yiran Chen, director of Athena and the John Cocke Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Duke. “It will require conversations and collaborations across academia, industry, government and investing communities worldwide. Bringing people together at the Abu Dhabi AI Summit is a crucial step toward delivering the impact from our ideas.”

Across two days of keynotes and panels, the summit covered four pillars that make up the fundamental layers of AI: representation and learning, compute and systems, hardware and physical constraints, and embedded intelligence and action.

Speakers included leaders whose foundational research has enabled entire subfields in modern AI, such as Ingrid Daubechies, the James. B Duke Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Mathematics at Duke, whose wavelet theory changed how information is represented, and Xuedong Huang, chief technology officer of Zoom, whose work helped create large-scale speech recognition.

What made the gathering special was not just the expertise and prominence of its attendees, but the breadth of its perspectives. Mathematics, hardware, systems and sensing are often discussed in isolation, but at the Abu Dhabi AI Summit, they were treated as interconnected parts of the same system. The conversations that followed generated fresh ideas at the intersection of disciplines.

“I’d like to congratulate Athena for organizing such a remarkable summit,” said Tei-Wei Kuo, the chief technology officer of Delta Electronics. “I personally learned so much from so many outstanding researchers, and it is very hard to gather so many outstanding researchers in a single event.”

Athena’s Growing International Reputation

The summit also reflected Athena’s growing international reach. MBZUAI, a rapidly expanding research university backed by significant national investment, partnered with Athena to bring global leaders to the UAE. The president of MBZUAI, Eric Xing, gave a keynote talk to open the summit about a new AI World Model.

Beyond technical sessions, participants discussed research collaboration, entrepreneurship and pathways for translating foundational breakthroughs into scalable, real-world applications. Athena faculty and partners also shared demonstrations highlighting how edge AI can support applications such as emergency response, robotics and resilient communication networks.

The USA–UAE Business Council hosted a banquet to welcome the Athena delegation, distinguished speakers and representatives of American companies operating in the UAE. Chen participated in a panel discussion during the banquet, along with the executives of US companies, about how the UAE can grow as a hub for AI development.

On the third day of the event, the delegation met with prominent investment and research organizations including MGX, the Technology Innovation Institute (TII) UAE and G42 to discuss potential collaborations in edge AI.

“The summit marked an important milestone for Athena, and we hope those conversations will lay the groundwork for future collaborations with MBZUAI and other research and education institutions in the UAE,” Chen said.

For Athena, the summit demonstrated its ability to assemble senior leaders at the highest level.

“This wasn’t your typical academic conference,” said Marvin Chang, executive in residence for Duke Engineering’s Master of Financial Technology program and one of the summit organizers. “It was about bringing together technological titans who have shaped the foundations of AI, along with global stakeholders, to ask what comes next and how to do it responsibly and at scale.”

As edge AI continues to mature and evolve, the challenges discussed in Abu Dhabi will only grow more pressing. The key to solving those problems, Chen said, comes down to three words: vision, collaboration and impact.

“Those three ideas were the guiding principles of this summit,” Chen said. “And they’re exactly what’s needed if edge AI is going to deliver lasting value to society.”