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  • NWC starts implementation of $1.14bn Projects in Eastern Province

    The National Water Company (NWC), Saudi Arabia announced the launch of the implementation phase of the desalinated water distribution system projects in Dammam, Al-Khobar, Al-Ahsa, and Qatif, for covering them completely, round-the-clock with desalinated water.

  • Saudi Arabia’s Film AlUla starts construction on studio complex

    Saudi Arabia’s Film AlUla, the film agency of the Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU), has announced the start of construction on the first phase of its ambitious new film and TV studio complex. The first phase will encompass approximately 330,000 square feet (30,000 square metres) and is scheduled to be up and running for the fourth quarter of 2023. The complex will feature two soundstages, production support buildings, workshops, a pyro/sfx building, catering facility and admin building plus a 70,000 square feet (6,500 sq m) backlot and a sound recording studio.

  • Foster + Partners Wins Competition for King Salman International Airport in Saudi Arabia

    Foster + Partners has been announced as the winner of the competition to design the new King Salman International Airport in Riyadh. Saudi culture and identity drive the airport's architectural design to ensure a unique travel experience for visitors and transit travelers. The master plan will boost Saudi Arabia's capital as a global logistics hub, stimulate transport, trade, and tourism, and act as a bridge connecting 180 million passengers from East to West.

  • Why are Chinese investors and startups so excited about Saudi Arabia?

    “In the last three years we built our HQ in Saudi, we built a local team and we looked at the needs: logistics and a cloud service is what is needed,” says Wong. “If you don’t invest in a cloud service and logistics, then you won’t change a fundamental thing. If you invest in that most important layer, you can have hundreds of thousands of startups later on. Those kind of investment opportunities no longer exist in mature markets.”

  • Why are Chinese investors and startups so excited about Saudi Arabia?

    “Mena used to be a region that was overlooked for decades, that’s why at that time we were curious,” says Jessica Wong, founder and managing partner at eWTPA Capital. “We started to evaluate and study other innovations and what are the chances of it happening in other emerging markets. Several of our portfolios did extremely well [in Mena] and we understood why.”

  • Israel’s Netanyahu reaches coalition deal with far-right Religious Zionism party

    Israeli Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu reached a coalition deal with the far-right Religious Zionism party, bringing him closer to securing a new government after an election last month, Netanyahu's Likud party said on Thursday. Religious Zionism will be given control of the Finance Ministry as part of a rotation, Likud said, though it did not lay out how the rotation would work. It will also have strong influence over policies in the occupied West Bank and the country's justice system.

  • Chart: LNG in Europe: Ready or Not?

    One of Europe's answers to the crisis is the increase of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports. Circumventing the use of pipelines from the east, LNG terminals open up a wider variety of potential suppliers. One of the main benefactors of this shift so far has been United States. In the first half of 2022, the U.S. became the world's largest LNG supplier, with 71 percent of its exports going to the EU and the UK.

  • Chart: Where a World Cup Spot Is Like Gold Dust

    For each of Africa's allocated berths at the World Cup, there were 11 teams competing to make the cut, meaning five teams went through to the competition, and 49 stayed at home. Contrast this with South America, where just two teams were fighting it out for each one of the region's berths, and the massive gulf in World Cup opportunity becomes apparent. Ten teams in South America (CONMEBOL confederation) entered the qualifying stage of the competition, with five places made available to them (one of which via an inter-confederation play-off eventually won by teams from AFC and CONCACAF).

  • Department of State Dedicates New U.S. Consulate General in Dhahran, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

    In an important symbol of our partnership with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Arabian Peninsula Affairs Daniel Benaim, U.S. Embassy Riyadh Chargé d’Affaires Martina Strong, and U.S. Consul General in Dhahran David Edginton officially dedicated the new U.S. Consulate General campus in Dhahran. The new campus is situated on a 10.5-acre site in the Al Andalus District in the city of Al-Khobar and incorporates numerous sustainable features to conserve resources and reduce operating costs, including demand-controlled ventilation, efficient site lighting, and on-site wastewater treatment and reuse. It achieved Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) Silver certification—a globally recognized mark of achievement in high-performance, best-in-class, green buildings. Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, LLP of Washington, D.C., was the design architect for the project, and Caddell Construction Company, LLC of Montgomery, Alabama, constructed the complex, employing a workforce of roughly 800 U.S., Saudi Arabian, and third-country nationals and injecting approximately $95 million into the local economy.

  • Chart: Covid Cases Surge in China

    Protests have erupted across mainland China against the Beijing government’s strict zero-Covid policies. Sparked by a deadly tower block fire in Urumqi, in the western region of Xinjiang, that claimed the lives of 10 people, demonstrations spread to several cities including Beijing and Shanghai. According to Al Jazeera, protesters say rescue services were unable to reach the residents due to barriers installed as part of lockdown measures.