Technology investments in Saudi Arabia worth more than $7.4 billion were pledged at the Leap summit in Riyadh on Monday, as local and global companies seek to cater to the kingdom's growing artificial intelligence and data centre markets.
DataVolt, a Riyadh-based data infrastructure and analytics company, said it will be developing a 1.5 gigawatt net-zero AI factory campus worth $5 billion in Oxagon − which is set to be the largest floating industrial complex in the world − located at the Neom mega-city.
The campus, which is scheduled to be operational in 2028, is being touted as being the first of its kind globally, Mohammed Abunayyan, board member of DataVolt, said at Leap.
Neom was designed to “tackle future challenges and there's nothing that exemplifies this more than the deal we're announcing today”, added Rayan Fayez, deputy chief executive of Neom.
Alfanar Projects, a Riyadh-based engineering and technology solutions firm, announced an 88 megawatt data centre project worth $1.4 billion spread across “four locations in two cities”, a top executive said.
“The world knows Saudi Arabia is exporting energy. But soon in the future, Saudi Arabia will export the data,” Amer Al Ajmi, an executive vice president at Alfanar Projects, said at Leap.
Telecoms company Mobily also committed to investing more than $905 million to develop data centres and submarine fibre infrastructure, its chief executive Salman Al Badran said.
The investment is part of Riyadh-based Mobily's “vision to elevate the kingdom to [becoming a] global digital hub”, and to cater to the growing demand for artificial intelligence, graphics processing units, hyperscalers, the Internet of Things and 5G, said Mr Al Badran.
Mobily is developing 39 megawatts of data centre capacity: 13MW has already been completed and will be commercially available by the end of the first quarter of 2025, with the rest to be deployed in 2026, he added.
Meanwhile, Zoom Communications, whose videoconferencing service propelled it to fame during the pandemic, announced an additional $75 million investment in Saudi Arabia to support Vision 2030, the kingdom's economic diversification programme.
The commitment includes the launch of a dedicated data centre in the kingdom “along with new AI-driven innovations designed to meet the needs of businesses, government entities and individuals”, the company said.
Saudi Arabian Railways announced a $51 million investment in a private fibre-optic network, in addition to receiving a licence from the kingdom's Communications, Space and Technology Commission to use and lease its telecom infrastructure for commercial use.
In other announcements, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise said it will be manufacturing networking gear of its subsidiary Aruba in Saudi Arabia, with more than 20,000 units of the Wi-Fi 7 compliant devices to be produced annually.
Also, SkyFive Arabia said they it will spend $100 million to expand its network and services in Saudi Arabia, elsewhere in the Middle East and Turkey, in addition to working on providing aircraft with internet speeds of up to 100 megabits per second.
Monday's announcements came after Leap on Sunday unveiled investment pledges worth $14.9 billion, mostly centred on AI.
Those deals included a $2 billion commitment from Alat, the sustainable technology manufacturing company backed by the kingdom's Public Investment Fund, and the world's biggest computer maker Lenovo to establish an advanced manufacturing and technology centre integrating AI and robotics.
Aramco Digital and US AI firm Groq also signed a $1.5 billion agreement to expand infrastructure and cloud computing in the kingdom.
Google also introduced new AI-driven digital infrastructure, while chipmaker Qualcomm confirmed the availability of its ALLaM language model on its Qualcomm AI Cloud at Leap.
China's Alibaba Cloud also launched its AI Enablement Programme, in co-operation with the Tuwaiq Academy and STC Academy, both based in Riyadh, to train national talent.
More than 1,800 technology brands and 680 start-ups are exhibiting at the Leap technology summit in Riyadh this week.
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The Abu Dhabi Supreme Petroleum Council was established in 1988 and is the highest governing body in Abu Dhabi’s oil and gas industry. The council formulates, oversees and executes the emirate’s petroleum-related policies. It also approves the allocation of capital spending across state-owned Adnoc’s upstream, downstream and midstream operations and functions as the company’s board of directors. The SPC’s mandate is also required for auctioning oil and gas concessions in Abu Dhabi and for awarding blocks to international oil companies. The council is chaired by Sheikh Khalifa, the President and Ruler of Abu Dhabi while Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, Abu Dhabi’s Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, is the vice chairman.
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The alternatives
• Founded in 2014, Telr is a payment aggregator and gateway with an office in Silicon Oasis. It’s e-commerce entry plan costs Dh349 monthly (plus VAT). QR codes direct customers to an online payment page and merchants can generate payments through messaging apps.
• Business Bay’s Pallapay claims 40,000-plus active merchants who can invoice customers and receive payment by card. Fees range from 1.99 per cent plus Dh1 per transaction depending on payment method and location, such as online or via UAE mobile.
• Tap started in May 2013 in Kuwait, allowing Middle East businesses to bill, accept, receive and make payments online “easier, faster and smoother” via goSell and goCollect. It supports more than 10,000 merchants. Monthly fees range from US$65-100, plus card charges of 2.75-3.75 per cent and Dh1.2 per sale.
• 2checkout’s “all-in-one payment gateway and merchant account” accepts payments in 200-plus markets for 2.4-3.9 per cent, plus a Dh1.2-Dh1.8 currency conversion charge. The US provider processes online shop and mobile transactions and has 17,000-plus active digital commerce users.
• PayPal is probably the best-known online goods payment method - usually used for eBay purchases - but can be used to receive funds, providing everyone’s signed up. Costs from 2.9 per cent plus Dh1.2 per transaction.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Juvenile arthritis
Along with doctors, families and teachers can help pick up cases of arthritis in children.
Most types of childhood arthritis are known as juvenile idiopathic arthritis. JIA causes pain and inflammation in one or more joints for at least six weeks.
Dr Betina Rogalski said "The younger the child the more difficult it into pick up the symptoms. If the child is small, it may just be a bit grumpy or pull its leg a way or not feel like walking,” she said.
According to The National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases in US, the most common symptoms of juvenile arthritis are joint swelling, pain, and stiffness that doesn’t go away. Usually it affects the knees, hands, and feet, and it’s worse in the morning or after a nap.
Limping in the morning because of a stiff knee, excessive clumsiness, having a high fever and skin rash are other symptoms. Children may also have swelling in lymph nodes in the neck and other parts of the body.
Arthritis in children can cause eye inflammation and growth problems and can cause bones and joints to grow unevenly.
In the UK, about 15,000 children and young people are affected by arthritis.
