Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid Al-Falih meets UK Minister of Investment Lord Gerry Grimstone in the UK on August 27.
Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid Al-Falih meets UK Minister of Investment Lord Gerry Grimstone in the UK on August 27.
Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid Al-Falih meets UK Minister of Investment Lord Gerry Grimstone in the UK on August 27.
Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid Al-Falih meets UK Minister of Investment Lord Gerry Grimstone in the UK on August 27.

Gulf

Saudi Arabia aims to boost trade with UK and invite companies to set up HQs

Sectors in focus include financial services, health care, chemicals, hospitality and consumer goods

Mariam Nihal

August 29, 2021

  • English
  • Arabic

Saudi Arabia plans to bolster trade ties with the UK and encourage British companies to open regional headquarters in the kingdom.

Saudi Investment Minister Khalid Al-Falih visited the UK on Thursday, aiming to boost bilateral trade in areas including financial services, health care, chemicals, hospitality and consumer goods.

Mr Al-Falih met Prince Khalid Bin Bandar Bin Sultan, the kingdom's ambassador to the UK, before meeting his British counterpart Lord Gerry Grimstone, the Secretary of State at the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, Kwasi Kwarteng, and the Prime Minister's Special Representative for Education, Sir Steve Smith.

“I met with Lord Gerry Grimstone, UK Minister of Investment, who praised recent developments in Saudi Arabia’s investment environment. We discussed bilateral investment opportunities for Saudi & UK companies. I commend his contribution to our strategic partnership,” Mr Al-Falih said on Twitter.


Saudi Arabia aims to double its investments in the UK's healthcare sector, Mr Al-Falih said. Health is one the most prominent fields of partnership between the two countries.

With more than 600 British companies in Saudi Arabia, the kingdom aims to benefit from British expertise in education, finance, supply chains in the health sector, advanced technologies and human resource development, Mr Al-Falih said.

He also spoke about Saudi Vision 2030 and its goals.

“We are keen for our friends in the UK to be fully acquainted with the available opportunities and the major developments that the investment environment witnessed in Saudi Arabia,” Al-Falih said. “We want their partnership to continue with us, while we are building a prominent investment stage of our national development process.”

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Company profile

Company: Eighty6 

Date started: October 2021 

Founders: Abdul Kader Saadi and Anwar Nusseibeh 

Based: Dubai, UAE 

Sector: Hospitality 

Size: 25 employees 

Funding stage: Pre-series A 

Investment: $1 million 

Investors: Seed funding, angel investors  

Timeline

2012-2015

The company offers payments/bribes to win key contracts in the Middle East

May 2017

The UK SFO officially opens investigation into Petrofac’s use of agents, corruption, and potential bribery to secure contracts

September 2021

Petrofac pleads guilty to seven counts of failing to prevent bribery under the UK Bribery Act

October 2021

Court fines Petrofac £77 million for bribery. Former executive receives a two-year suspended sentence 

December 2024

Petrofac enters into comprehensive restructuring to strengthen the financial position of the group

May 2025

The High Court of England and Wales approves the company’s restructuring plan

July 2025

The Court of Appeal issues a judgment challenging parts of the restructuring plan

August 2025

Petrofac issues a business update to execute the restructuring and confirms it will appeal the Court of Appeal decision

October 2025

Petrofac loses a major TenneT offshore wind contract worth €13 billion. Holding company files for administration in the UK. Petrofac delisted from the London Stock Exchange

November 2025

180 Petrofac employees laid off in the UAE

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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.”

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Updated: August 29, 2021, 1:53 PM