Saudi Arabia unveils intellectual property strategy amid efforts to diversify economy

Blueprint aims to boost investment and create jobs

Saudi Arabia is building projects including a $500 billion futuristic city. Photo: Neom

Saudi Arabia has unveiled a new intellectual property strategy as the Arab world’s largest economy aims to support innovation and creativity and boost investments.

The National Intellectual Property Strategy was launched by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.

“We have minds and energies passionate about innovation and creativity, and by enabling them, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia will become a vibrant environment for a knowledge economy based on an integrated intellectual property ecosystem that develops innovative technologies and industries and contributes to the growth of enterprises,” Prince Mohammed said.

“The National Intellectual Property Strategy will further enable stimulating investment, create high-quality jobs and raise awareness of creators and innovators' rights.”

The launch of the strategy comes as Saudi Arabia aims to diversify its economy away from oil as part of its Vision 2030 programme. The kingdom is building projects spanning sectors including tourism, aviation, real estate and entertainment.

Saudi Arabia’s economy is forecast to grow by 7.6 per cent in 2022 and 3.7 per cent next year after expanding 3.2 per cent last year amid higher oil prices and efforts to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the International Monetary Fund said in its World Economic Outlook in October.

The country’s economy grew by 8.8 per cent in the third quarter of 2022 from the same period a year ago, driven by a sharp rise in both oil and non-oil activities, according to the latest data by General Authority for Statistics.

The National Intellectual Property Strategy is based on four pillars. These include IP creation, IP administration, IP commercialisation and IP protection, according to the SPA.

In a bid to achieve these pillars, work will be done to boost co-operation and integration between national entities as key partners to back the objectives of the new strategy.

The IP creation pillar will enhance the creation of national high-value intellectual property assets by supporting young talent in the country, while the protection pillar aims to stimulate the market economy through the protection of creative rights, it said.

The commercialisation pillar will contribute to the growth and attraction of investments in the kingdom.

Meanwhile, the administration pillar aims to improve the value of intellectual property by establishing a fast and high-quality registration system to ensure effective management of human creativity.

Each pillar will have a number of initiatives assigned to government agencies and will be measured periodically according to a governance framework that defines roles and responsibilities.

“The adoption of NIPST supports the empowerment of innovators in various fields to build an ambitious country and a diversified and prosperous economy for the kingdom and attracts interested researchers, entrepreneurs and innovators from Saudi Arabia and around the world towards innovation, creativity and respect of IP rights,” the SPA said.

The kingdom is developing new projects such as a $500 billion futuristic city named Neom and other developments as it continues to focus on diversifying its economy and attracting more investment to the country.