IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

NEOM has announced architecture and engineering partners to help complete Phase 1 of The Line in Saudi Arabia

NEOM has announced the appointment of world-leading partners to deliver the core city planning, design and engineering for the first phase of THE LINE, the linear smart city under construction in NEOM.

NEOM said Delugan Meissl Associate Architects (DMAA), Gensler and Mott MacDonald are collaborating with THE LINE’s design, development and project delivery teams to provide urban design, planning consultancy and infrastructure design for the first phase of the city.

Neom is defying traditional principles of urbanism, design, architecture, technology, and the very concept of smart cities. A key factor enabling this reimagination is that Neom is being built from scratch, while most other cities are being retrofitted to become smart -- and none with the budgets that Neom is working with.

While we talk about smart cities, Saudi Arabia is creating a cognitive city, Neom, which envisages what a city must provide its citizens 20-30 years ahead of time. It is building it now with a $500 billion outlay. Urban planning and living are at the heart of this model, with 95% of the land being devoted to nature. That it's being built ground-up enables avant-garde thinking to take shape, with almost no constraints on imagination, innovation, resources or regulation.

The 100 percent pedestrianised city is set to create 380,000 jobs at the Neom giga project and has been launched by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

A totally-pedestrianised city is set to create 380,000 jobs in Saudi Arabia as Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman launched ‘The Line’, the latest piece in the futuristic jigsaw that is the Neom $500 billion giga project.

Nutanix, a leader in hybrid multicloud computing, has reiterated its commitment to helping public sector organizations in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia embrace the power of hybrid multicloud as part of their digital transformation initiatives. The company is developing and empowering its channel ecosystem to become true ‘Champions of Nutanix’ and help government agencies sort through the complexities of cloud adoption and deliver the applications, networks, cloud services, storage solutions and other IT components that they need.

Saeed Nader, Channel Sales Manager - Saudi Arabia Public Sector at Nutanix says, “Nutanix as a company very much supports Vision 2030 that promotes digital transformation in the Kingdom. In the age of the hybrid workplace, cloud computing is a key pillar of any digital transformation strategy. As per the Saudi findings of the fourth Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Index, 81% of respondents in Saudi Arabia agreed that multicloud was the ideal IT operating model as it enables them to strike a balance between cost, complexity, speed, and scale of operations and generate more revenue. However, far fewer reported having deployed it as they face inter-cloud security, mobility, management, and skillset challenges as they embark on infrastructure change. This is true for both, the public as well as the private sector.”

Red Hat is delivering a wave of cutting-edge solutions to redefine the country’s global competitiveness

Red Hat, Inc., the world's leading provider of open source solutions, has released breakthrough research unearthing the nexus between the innovative propensity of enterprise open source software and digital transformation in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). These findings are backed by increased global adoption of open source solutions as cost-effective, flexible, reliable, secure, and alternative foundational systems to drive innovation and digital transformation.

For 4 years, the National Transformation Program has continued its rapid progress towards achieving excellence in government performance, enhancing economic potentials, and upgrading the standard of living services, by accelerating the pace of implementation of basic and digital infrastructure projects, and engaging beneficiaries in identifying challenges, creating solutions and evaluating the performance of the program as the first program The Saudi Vision 2030 implementation is the largest in terms of the strategic objectives assigned to it.And in the steps of the trustworthy towards contributing to empowering the private sector, raising the attractiveness of the labor market, empowering society groups, ensuring the sustainability of vital resources, developing the tourism and non-profit sectors, in addition to raising the quality of government services provided to individuals, the private and non-profit sectors, and improving the social services system, health care and safety levels. Since its inception, the program has managed to reach far beyond its goals, assuring the Saudis that their great dream of building a vibrant society, a prosperous economy, and an ambitious nation, is easy for souls of their own emotions, and with the determination of men who can achieve what they want their homeland to be in 2030.

Interview: Abdullah Alswaha

Q: How will the planned digitisation policies impact the Kingdom’s citizens and businesses?

ABDULLAH ALSWAHA: Saudi Arabia’s ICT sector has come a long way over the past 15 years. However, neither the industry’s potential, nor its role as an enabler have been fully realised as of yet. This represents a major opportunity. Both citizens and business now largely depend on digital applications for their welfare and competitiveness. Vision 2030 and the National Transformation Programme 2020 (NTP) have set the bar high for the role of digitisation. Digitisation will enhance consumer welfare through more efficient, transparent and user-friendly government services. In addition, it will enable policymaking participation, timely feedback on state services and reduce the time spent on administrative procedures.

In a bid to reshape the residential landscape in Saudi Arabia, Alfanar Global Development has announced that it will inject SR10 billion ($2.7 billion) to develop five residential communities in NEOM, the smart city currently under construction in the Kingdom.

The announcement from Alfanar comes following an array of agreements inked by NEOM with investors for the first-phase construction of its residential communities to accommodate the growing workforce in the region.

Minister of Education Dr. Hamad Al-Sheikh underlined the importance of analyzing and evaluating the impact of the accelerated digital transformation and technologies on education and society as a whole.

He pointed out that the coronavirus pandemic continues to cast a deep and direct shadow on the world at the social and economic levels,” which will accelerate the digital transformation of societies.

This will require a need to test the flexibility of educational systems and their resilience and recovery and adopt new and innovative educational methods, Al-Sheikh said.

Digital transformation will play a key role in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic, a G20 meeting of research ministers in Italy has said.

Saudi Minister of Education Dr. Hamad bin Mohammed Al-Asheikh, who attended the Friday meeting, stressed the importance of analyzing and evaluating the impact of rapid digital transformation and technologies on education and society as a whole.

ICT spending in Saudi Arabia will reach 35.9 billion in 2016 as organizations across the Kingdom have started to embrace digital transformation initiatives in an effort to optimize costs and improve their business process efficiencies.

'The Saudi ICT market is highly competitive and only the most progressive service providers with strong capabilities around emerging technologies will continue to grow' says Abdulaziz Al-Helayyil IDC's regional director for Saudi Arabia Kuwait and Bahrain.

Justice Minister Waleed Al-Samaani on Sunday launched e-notarization, starting a new phase in the ministry’s digitization efforts. Starting Nov. 18, e-notarization will provide several services that dispense paperwork and spare clients the need to visit notarial offices for low-risk powers of attorney (POAs).

“The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) is continuing its efforts to achieve the objectives of the National Transformation Program 2020 and Vision 2030, which focus on enhancing the user-friendliness and cost-effectiveness of government services,” the minister said during the inauguration event in Riyadh.

Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, has announced one of the greatest construction projects in history called Neom.

Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, has announced one of the greatest and most complex construction projects in history, which involves transforming a desert the size of Belgium into a high-tech city-region called Neom.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a bubbling beaker of Arabian tradition mixed with science-bending futurism – with megacity Neom spearheading the change.

From its technological verve to its sustainability ambitions, it’s clear that Neom is firmly in charge of its own narrative, with robotic avatars and holograms ready to become part of everyday life.

Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Bati, the CEO of the National Housing Company, has announced the launch of a new project to develop the city of "Banan" in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, in partnership with the Egyptian Talaat Moustafa Group.

Al-Bati, speaking at the Cityscape Global conference held in Riyadh, stated that the new project aims to create a comprehensive smart residential city with sustainable quality of life standards, implemented according to international standards.

I congratulate the Saudi Ministry of Justice for winning the UN-sponsored technical excellence award at the World Summit on Information Society in Geneva. The ministry won the award following a global contest on best information and communication technologies initiatives. This was in recognition of the launch of a series of “paperless courts” in a number of parts of the Kingdom.

The system allows individuals to submit documents electronically and without the need to visit offices. This saves time and effort, and speeds up judicial processes. The Justice Ministry’s move comes in the context of the digital transformation enhancing e-government performance that is consistent with the Kingdom’s 2030 Vision. We hope that we will see a day when members of the public no longer need to visit government departments.

Saudi Arabia's Riyadh has emerged as the top Smart City in the Arab world, surpassing the capitals of France, Germany, and Spain in a global ranking. The Smart City index aims to assess how technology is improving the quality of life for residents. Riyadh has climbed from 55th in 2019 to 30th in the latest ranking, making it the third highest Arab city. Furthermore, Makkah, Jeddah, and Madinah have made it to the list for the first time, with Makkah ranked 52nd, Jeddah at 56th, and Madinah at 85th. Abu Dhabi and Dubai remain the leading Arab cities, ranking 13th and 17th on the list of 141 settlements.

The Smart City observatory, one of the global indexes that evaluates the readiness of cities, is an interdisciplinary approach for researchers, urban planners, and decision-makers to assess the contribution of smart technologies in improving the quality of life for residents. The improvement in Saudi cities' ranking is attributed to the collective efforts of concerned agencies, including the National Smart City Platform launched by the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority.