“Saudi Arabia was one of the emerging markets that recorded YoY growth in 2022 nearing the $1Bn mark. The VC ecosystem surpassed FY 2021’s numbers by 72% aggregating $987M in funding across 144 deals, reporting a 3% decline in terms of total transactions.”
2022 Saudi Arabia Venture Capital Report [Magnitt]
“According to a report released by the Ministry of Investment in Saudi Arabia, the number of foreign tourists who landed in the kingdom during Q2 of 2022 reached 3.6 million people. The ministry also reported that the spending by tourists coming in from abroad increased to SAR 27 billion during the first half of the year 2022. These numbers were upped by 570% in 2022 Q2, as for domestic tourism it has increased by 31.”
“Conceptually, there’s enormous potential in this country, and it’s certainly supported by the fact that there are a handful of very profitable mines, To elaborate on that is what it’s all about really.”
Mark Bristow, President and Chief Executive, Barrick Gold. Saudi Arabia Seeks to Lure Global Miners in Bid to Overhaul Its Economy [Wall Street Journal]
“The strategy of the fund has parallels with Japanese trading houses, which took equity stakes in mining projects during the country’s postwar industrialisation to supply manufacturers.”
Saudi Arabia launches mining fund in effort to reduce oil dependency [Financial Times]
“The situation has changed, and now we have some divergence—a tale of two cities. You have the oil-exporting countries who keep enjoying strong tailwinds. The price of oil is still high. The reforms they introduced over the last five years are paying off, and the way that they managed the Covid crisis and their ability to recover fast has strengthened their capacity to generate growth. On the other hand, middle-income and emerging economies are facing headwinds.”
Jihad Azour, Director, Middle East and Central Asia Department, International Monetary Fund. The Middle East’s Economic Outlook [CSIS – Babel]
“It is understandable why people get offended when the practice or the dance is taken of out its historical context. People in the Gulf region are very interested and invested in their lineage and historical roots.”
-Ghazi Al Mulaifi, visiting assistant professor of Music at New York University Abu Dhabi. Saudi Arabia tightens Ardah dance rules to keep tradition intact [The National]
“You have the world and his wife coming here looking for capital. It feels like 2008.”
The new Gulf sovereign wealth fund boom [Financial Times]
“We like to socialise, but we don’t have bars or clubs – we have coffee shops.”
Ali Alkhabbaz, Head of Coffee, Nejoud Restaurant Management Inside Saudi Arabia’s coffee shop boom [World Coffee Portal]
“Above all, the 2022 World Cup highlighted the shifting contours of a global order that, for all the Scandinavian and German hand-wringing during the tournament, is less centered on “the West” than it has been at any point since the emergence of the postwar international architecture in 1945. The process of geopolitical rebalancing has been underway for more than a decade; but given the Gulf Arab states’ pivotal role in energy and geopolitics—and increasingly in soccer and sports more broadly—2022 may eventually be seen as the year that confirmed their centrality to the global order that is currently taking shape.”
-Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, Qatar’s Successful World Cup Signals a New Era in the Gulf and Beyond [Arab Center Washington]
“It’s really about creating an ecosystem around our problems so you can leverage non-DOD resources and capabilities in order to help us do our mission better.”
-U.S. Brig. Gen. John Cogbill, CENTCOM, Deputy Director of Operations during Innovation Oasis. US top Middle East commander tests new model of deterring Iran [Al-Monitor]
