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Saudi Arabia Plans To Swap Oil Production For Gaming
The Kingdom is going all in with a massive new game development program.
As Saudi Arabia rapidly transitions from an oil-reliant economy, the government has begun investing in several tech-centric and sustainable projects. With a disproportionately young population, 21 million of which are gamers, officials have recently decided to stake $38 billion on building a local gaming industry from scratch.
The Savvy Games Group — a subsidiary of the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) — will help Saudi Arabia develop and publish its game titles while building a home-grown gaming ecosystem in the capital, Riyadh.
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Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund has already invested billions of dollars into the likes of Nintendo, Activision Blizzard, and Tencent. In a recent interview with Bloomberg News, the CEO of Savvy, Brian Ward, said that the company would look for opportunities to “work together on publishing in (the Middle East and North Africa), run their Esports businesses, or develop new IP together”.
The PIF’s recent round of acquisitions and an extensive portfolio of investments suggest that Saudi Arabia will continue on its aggressive mission to play alongside industry giants such as Microsoft and Sony.