To boldly go where no man has gone before.
The popular Star Trek phrase would perhaps be an apt way to describe the mega ambitions powering Saudi Arabia’s upcoming new technology event LEAP.
In a world exclusive, Gulf Business can now reveal details about LEAP, a global tech event set to be hosted in Saudi’s capital Riyadh in early February 2021, aimed at showcasing and supporting pioneering innovations from across the world.
“LEAP will be the most iconic and seismic tech event for a generation. It will serve the visionary strategic plan of the government to become one of the world’s top 20 tech-enabled countries,” says Abdullah Amer Al-Swaha, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology.
Technology is a fundamental pillar of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, and the last few years have seen a significant acceleration in the adoption of digital transformation initiatives.
The numbers back up the kingdom’s aspirations. Saudi Arabia is the region’s largest information and communication technology (ICT) market and was ranked among the top 15 globally in 2019.
According to IDC, ICT spending in the kingdom is set to reach $37bn this year, up 2.4 per cent on 2019.
The government, finance and communication sectors will spend in excess of $3.8bn on ICT this year, accounting for almost 53 per cent of the total spend.
“The Saudi ICT market is grappling with a wave of new digital transformation realities,” said Hamza Naqshbandi, IDC’s country manager for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.
This story is from the July 2020 edition of Gulf Business.
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This story is from the July 2020 edition of Gulf Business.
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