Saudi Arabia Vision 2030 Pivot from Oil towards Tech

There is no future for those countries that rely only on intermittent resources like their vast oil and natural gas wells. Switching from a big oil-producing country to a giant tech nation is normal.

Saudi Arabia is receiving billion dollars investment offers from major IT companies for building cloud computing centers in the region. These investments will position Saudi Arabia as the most prominent digital market in the Middle East and North Africa.

In an international technology conference in Riyadh, the Minister of Communication and Information Technology of Saudi stated the famous tech giants are ready to invest billions of dollars in the Saudi IT field. Microsoft is investing about $2.1 billion, Oracle is investing $1.5 billion, and Huawei, a Chinese tech company, is investing around $400 million.

All these investments are a cornerstone of Saudi Arabia’s strategy to shift its economic corridor from oil towards technology, known as “vision 2030”.

Saudi Arabia’s vision 2030 has already taken its first step with a $1 billion investment in AI and metaverse by Tonomus, a NEOM digitization partner. NEOM is a planned intelligent city project owned by the Saudi crown prince and located in Tabuk province; having a mix of engineering, architecture, and sustainability.