The question is not why would the Saudis want to invest, it's why an industry that always talks about how progressive and innovative it is is so happy to compromise those values.
This presents a conundrum. Tech companies are fond of pseudo-revolutionary mission statements that extol the virtues of diversity, tolerance, freedom of expression and other progressive ideals. They have argued that their technologies are part of a force for global liberation — that forging more open communication and economic productivity through technology will loosen the grip of tyrannies across the globe. For much of the last year, Silicon Valley has also promised a revolution in its own culture, with large and small companies alike vowing to become more inclusive of women and minorities.
To outsiders it looks fake, hypocritical, and a little immoral. $300 million is nice, but why sell your soul for it?
I think the answer is that Silicon Valley is all those things. They are caught up in a moral panic. Look at their history: pro women's right's publically, but sexist privately; anti-school choice for the average person, but sends their kids to private school ; reject new water pipeline for farmers because piped water over long distance is unnatural; keeps existing water rights to their cities. Silicon Valley is not and probably never has been virtuous ; it has often virtue signaled.
I'm reminded of the "values of the carphone warehouse [of which there are none]" bit.
Employees have values. Companies have employees and assets. They are a moral compromise by their very nature. Big (public) companies especially, have little interest in being "ethical", as by their sheer size, their economical duties are enormous.
I do believe this would dwarf any concerns short of... Well, what issue can you have that's big enough to risk the livelihoods of thousands or millions? I can think of none.
(I'm trying to describe things as they are, not as I would like them. The lesson is that to change the way companies behave you have to change all of society. In my humble opinion, "values" are the result required for homeostatis, and almost never the motivators.)
> $300 million is nice, but why sell your soul for it?
This is what "taking money" means. You don't need to be more specific about the investor. You cannot take any money if you are not willing to give your soul in exchange. Even a $30k/year paycheck requires that in many regards.
Does accepting investments from Saudi Arabia represent a compromise of those values? Are Saudi Arabian investors attempting to limit diversity, tolerance, and freedom of expression?
I fail to see how accepting investments from Saudi Arabia is selling once's soul or compromising on those values. If anything, the fact that Saudi Arabia is diversifying its investments and becoming invested in the economies of Western countries is likely a driving factor of their latest pushes towards more egalitarian (but, relatively speaking, still backward-as-hell) values.
Why is this complicated?