The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: All right. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome. Thank you for taking the time and being with us on this beautiful morning in Riyadh. I lead IEC in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. I'm the moderator for this strategic and insightful workshop. As you all know, ladies and gentlemen, that disruptive technologies and digitalization tie at the very heart of Saudi Arabia's transformation journey. Anchored is the Vision 2030, the envision has rapid advancements across all sectors driving a very dynamic evolution within the entire tech ecosystem. This workshop will explore the capabilities of local Saudi firms and their roles in shaping the digital landscape across critical industries. Additionally, it will also highlight opportunities of collaboration with international partners and risky challenges, and discuss strategies to overcome them, ensuring that the Kingdom's digital economy aspirations remain on course.
I would like to quickly introduce my panel. On my right I have Wael Alfattouh the Chief Sizery at SITE. I also have our special international speaker Maurico Hernandez that heads global privacy at Johnson&Johnson. On my left Omar Boulos the CEO and market unit lead at Accenture and then last but not least Muath Alghamdi government sales at Mobily. We have covered all assets and we look forward to an insightful discussion. I usually like to start these discussions by giving the panelists a quick minute to introduce themselves and their companies, so let's start from the right, Wael, why don't you take the first shot.
>> WAEL ALFATTOUH: Good morning, everyone. My name is Wael. I started my career in consulting about 15 years with PWC and then moved to banking and now I have the pleasure of being the Chief Advisory Officer at SITE.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Brilliant. Thank you. Mauricoi.
>> MAURICIO HERNANDEZ: Thank you. And thank you to the IGF and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. I'm currently the Head of Global Privacy at Johnson&Johnson. My background is as an attorney and ICT and Internet of Things. Thank you.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Thank you, Mauricio, it's a pleasure to host you in Riyadh and looking forward to hear from you as well. Omar.
>> OMAR BOULOS: Now, just so the panel, we were given 30 seconds and now he says one minute. Now you understand how the session is going to go. My name is Omar the privilege of being Accenture from the Middle East. I moved last year from Houston to Riyadh, this is home now. I'm delighted to be here; I've had privilege of working across numerous industries and many government entities.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Thank you. Muath.
>> MUATH ALGHAMDI: Thank you so much for the invitation. My name is Muasth. I started internationally and working in private and public sector. And then I decided to shift gears and moved to Ericson when I was looking after the radio. I feel privileged to be part of the people who expanded the 5G deployment in Saudi Arabia, and currently I work with the Government Sales in Mobily. I've been there for the past five years. Yeah. That's me.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Great. It's a pleasure to have all of you here with me to do justice to the discussion as well. What I'm trying to do, if we have time, I'll try to get some views from the audience as well. So, if you have a question, I would request you to park it until the end, and time permitting, I'll try to turn to you so that you get the most of this panel as well. All righty, that being said, let's get started.
Wael, why don't we start with you. Obviously, the Kingdom has meated significant strides in the ICT sector under the Vision 2030. We're at the cusp of a change, the scale and nature of which the modern world is not seen in the Kingdom. I would like to kickstart this discussion by understanding how has your organization contributed to this, particularly in the deployment of end‑to‑end digital solutions across key sectors.
>> WAEL ALFATTOUH: Thank you. I think most of you have heard of SITE in the context of cybersecurity. 90% of the time that's the context. Honestly, until I joined SITE about nine months ago, that was my perception as well.
What's interesting to know and what's amazing to understand is also that SITE actually has over 300Saudi staff that are digitally focused. Over half of those ‑‑ almost half of those are programmers. So, we have a huge ‑‑ that has been developing over the years, over 15 different platforms. They're all end‑to‑end solutions, and over six products that are also all focused, yes, mostly toward cybersecurity, but covering things like data analysis. We've launched 360 here in the conference two days ago. We actually have an event's management platform. So, what I'm saying in this is to give you context that the contribution of the Saudi Nationals and the Saudi firms to the digitalization in Saudi is critical for the momentum that you just mentioned.
We are no longer consumers. We are producers of technology, and this is a critical step toward moving from producers to inventors as well. This is ‑‑ we see this across the board. The R&D investment, the investment in localization that is happening to bring in the technology, not only from a white‑labeling perspective, but from a sovereignty perspective, owning the IP of what we're producing and what we're using.
You see this across the board, and it's wonderful to see, and SITE has been at the forefront of that working with the other partners. And this is another thing about the ecosystem that's really wonderful to see. We see a lot of the Saudi companies collaborating towards producing these IPs, towards increasing that maturity, this is something we see and we're happy to be part of that.
As we progress forward, the shift outside when you see the booths and when you see the products that are being advertised, whether they are the cybersecurity level or the ERP level, or the event management level, at every level you will see a Saudi player with their own IP contributing to their digitalization and transformation. And this is something that we're very proud to be part of.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. I think for an initial remark, you have created the key priorities, vision, and what the Kingdom has done. Seeing from the consumer to tech producer. We're seeing this across the entire landscape, software, hardware now, and cybersecurity. Very interesting times ahead. I'll come back to you, you know, but you referred to something very interesting around the ecosystem and the partnership, right. You would like to turn to Muath here. Muath, obviously, telecom operators, and you kind of alluded to it in your introduction as well. Telecom operators are in a unique position, both as consumers and providers of digital technology and services. As a meeting and evolving telecom operator, how is Mobily helping connect Saudi Arabia, and bringing an ecosystem‑driven approach to help support the digital aspirations within the kingdom.
>> MUATH ALGHAMDI: Wonderful. I think this is a very important question. When you look at the massive digital transformation that the whole country is going through, we are no longer just a tech operator. That's not only exclusive for Mobily, by the way. That's across the industry. Tech companies are taking the role of digital. And when you look at how are we perceived in the market, we're more of a visualizer partner for both private as well as public sectors when it comes to the digital transformation journey. I think that comes in to the point, that comes into, and even look at enterprise, look at government sectors. Us being a service provider, means that we have an elaborate network. Not just network. When you look at the infrastructure, from the 5G expansions that we're undergoing as well as the fiber network, that is not just in Saudi Arabia, but across over all, as well as the data centers, first the first in Saudi and one of the largest data centers not just Saudi but the area. That allows IPs and entities to consume.
That's when the second, if you look at what we're doing with entities in terms of ‑‑ in terms of strategic initiatives show and I think ‑‑ it was highlighted in Monday's session when he brought up the Smart Meter project, and we've been lucky enough to partner with different companies while under this provision of the Ministry of Z, we partnered together for one of the largest Smart meters, not only in the region. But looking at it to use the time of looking at business and offloading all of their technical burden on us.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Thank you very much. I like the word that you used to encapsulate the value proposition that telecom operators in their evolution is a digital enabler, right, which is a significant shift. You talked about some of the emerging technologies that are a sector foundation for digitalization. 5G, the digital backbone, all of the technologies will be using that backbone. Thanks for highlighting that.
Omar, I would like to bring you into the picture. Obviously, we heard about the transformation of local service providers, we've heard about telecom operators transforming both internally and bringing that internal transformation out to the market as well.
So, from area lens, you know, I know this is your second stint in the region, so it's a really different region now from what it was when you initially came here. So, as we are in the execution phase of this landmark vision, how do you see the confluence of tech in something and business outcomes to become more entwined.
>> OMAR BOULOS: Thank you for that. Maybe just allow me to say a few things and just build on what my colleagues have said. It's no longer an individual sport. It's a team sport. You know, you said this is my second stint in the region. The other thing that's changed drastically is technology. Technology is changing at such a rapid pace. I think everyone here understands that.
Let me just give you just a couple of examples. It used to be, you know, a new technology comes in, you look at your existing business processes and you say, how does that technology help me? How do I, you know, enhance, improve, drive efficiency to my existing business process? That's no longer how things work and how things should work.
You know, what needs to happen today is we need to look at that business process and rewire it completely. Rewire it so that we can take care of the capabilities that are out there that were not out there. But you cannot do that if you don't start where value comes from. You need to understand the value. You need to understand top‑line value, bottom‑line value, what is cost, what is upside, what is down side. You need to understand your digital core.
A lot of people, we talk a lot about technology, technology can be shiny objects, but if you don't have the right capabilities, and you know the Kingdom all hyperscalers have announced plans to either be here or are here already. The capabilities that exist today with sites and mobile he's and everything else with the data centers, cybersecurity, IP applications, that was not there before. It's capabilities that need to exist.
Talent, you know, a lot of people talk about talent. It's, you know, this place has tremendous talent. It's the skills that we need to be looking for because talent exists. I'll say that. Less to be an organization of 780,000 people, and I can tell you that the talent here rivals talent anywhere. It's the skill sets that we need to make sure that are built properly.
We'll talk about regulation of it, but responsible AI and continuous improvement. So, it's a team sport. A lot of things have to come together, and it's no longer about take this technology and drive another layer of automation or efficiency. It's truly about rewiring, and this is where we all need to come together.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Thank you. I completely agree with that. Especially, as we approach the era of generative AI. It's not a plug‑and‑play solution that comes in and can solve all of your business challenges, right. I completely support that. Would you like to augment or add something to that.
>> Just quick. I like the word rewire. I would like to apply it to thinking, and this is something that is a message, really, to everyone who is coming to Saudi to do business. Rewire your thinking in a sense that you're not here to sell. You're here to partner. If you're coming in looking at everybody here on the market as a partner, and you're bringing value of partnership, then you're going to do really well because the thinking has changed. People don't expect now for you to walk through the door with a value proposition that doesn't include a win‑win situation, what are you developing, you are bringing something to the table, and you expect me to bring something as well. And we come and we will do that. I think it's ‑‑ I agree with that. We need to rewire how we look at this.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Very well articulated. I'd like to turn to Mauricio. I know you've been patiently listening to the trends and dynamics within the kingdom. Since we have the pleasure of having you in the panel, I would like to shift gears a little bit and get some perspectives from Latin. Obviously, it's a very dynamic region. I want to understand from you, how have digital technologies in that region influences the strategic direction, especially of the private sector? And, you know, to what extent are these digital strategies in your region aligned with the global strategies of key industrial, you know, sectors? I think everyone here would be very happy to hear some perspectives from you from Latin.
>> MAURICIO HERNANDEZ: Thank you. Well, first of all, and I will take some ideas I have heard from my colleagues regarding partnering furtherer than creating, and also to talk about it as a team sport.
As you may know, the Latin countries are also members to the UN, and we are committed to comply with the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. This means in essence, to be supportive, to be in technology for most of the 17 goals we are committed to comply in a decade.
In this sense, Latin is not connected from the world. Companies are improving a lot of methods, creating partnerships with entrepreneurs and startups so to become more strong. And this is a matter to main example, to provide an example between skills and investments.
Now, this is not ‑‑ this is happening ‑‑ and healthcare industry is not outside of this. The pandemic faces us before a tremendous challenge for getting and to find alternative ways for living in isolation. So in this way, what we need to understand is that partnership is the reason and the matter that the way we need to move further, and we need to take the best of all the regions to develop more and more solutions.
These days, for example, telemedicine, medicine in distance, and technology assistive to medicine, which are different concepts in the industry, are made by entrepreneurs while created by entrepreneurs which are supported by the huge industries. That had tremendous benefits for all the parties.
In my personal perspective, governments are not a side of this as well, and to bring in more and more e‑governments and governments to implement e‑solutions for providing citizens of benefits in mobility and avoid the wasting of time, which is most of the cases that we face in our society. And I want to remind the following. Saudi Arabia has a tremendous opportunity in Latin. Do not lack to consider this. We have skills, we have a good workers, very hard workers. We are developing a lot, but we need the guide and technology to get in good results of our work developments. Solutions are waiting for you. Do not miss Latin America.
And in this sense, I think cellular is a tremendous opportunity, to share your developments which I am surprised about them, and to make entrepreneurs working in a different manner and shift the way of thinking.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Thank you. Thank you, Mauricio, for sharing those perspectives. I'm sure it's very valuable to get that flavor from different regions and try to adopt to it and share some best practices.
I'll come back in a minute. I wanted to shift gears a little bit. While we talked about digital ambitions and spoken about the potential that Saudi Arabia brings to the global economy from a digital standpoint, there are challenges, right. There are challenges that are embedded with this kind of transformation. I think first and foremost, we have this challenge. Probably, Muath, you could start off by sharing some views around this. When it comes to compatibility and integration, when aligning these end‑to‑end solutions which are based on disruptive tech, legacy infrastructure. How important is business alignment and the transformation goals to start this for digital journey, right? From your experience, what can you see for organizations that are trying to navigate this journey?
>> MUATH ALGHAMDI: Okay. Well naturally, in your unique situation and for every organization a unique situation applies, but there are some things that are consistent in at least the way not to do things. Maybe I'm not going to go into how you should do it. Let me tell you for sure how you should not do it. You should not do it in silos. That is one of the most consistent reasons why transformations and digitalization fail. Because the organization handles it in silos. Each team is chasing digitalization as an objective, but not aligning on how to achieve that. The prioritization of achieving that, and what happens is literally, it's like digging a tunnel on both sides and then finding out that you're just not connected. So, you're all going toward this central location that you're all supposed to connect on, when you get there, you find yourself connected at different level, different ways, things are not aligned.
So, in this short amount of time, if there is one thing I should tell you that you should avoid is doing it in silos. I'm going to use the expert strategy, apologize, consultant is consultant, right. But strategy ‑‑ forget the strategy, objective, at least is alignment. Right. Understand where you're going, why you're getting there, don't do digitalization for the sake of digitalization. Why are you doing it? And then align with the rest of the company, and the rest of the teams and you will get better value for it.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. And I'll just build on that a little bit and take the liberty of using another S word, skills. Right. So, we've talked about strategy, but strategy without skills, and this is something that Omar alluded to in the initial comments as well. Omar as a global consulting leader, how do you build the Saudi company efforts in overcoming some challenges around uncertainty and regulatory compliance, and more importantly, you know, the tech expertise shortage, especially when it comes to emerging tech, you know, which are fundamental in deploying those innovative end‑to‑end solutions, what are your views on this very important theme?
>> OMAR BOULOS: Thank you. I was looking for other S words that we can go through, sustainability and others as well that mean different things to different people, including of course, skills and strategy. But maybe a few comments on regulatory. I've been in Saudi in Riyadh, as I've said, for one year. And having had the privilege of working across numerous organizations, I don't think there is anyone here who will say the framework or the strategies are lacking. As a matter of fact, I would actually say if you had not had a chance to read the value of responsible AI ‑‑ you should. It's something that everyone here should be proud of. The NCIT and the strategies that we've laid out, pre, post, where we are, I mean it's unbelievable the things that are out there in terms of the environment.
And then let me say this because I've had this experience myself. I've never walked into a regulatory authority and said I have a problem and someone didn't say let's talk through it. You know, so I ‑‑ I'm going to say the environment here is one that will listen and help understand and how they can help is everyone wants to help. Everyone is working toward the same objective. This is not about regulation for regulation's sake. It may be missing, let's talk through it.
But the frameworks that exist here are, you know, I think many countries would love to have some of those frameworks in place. And if you're going to go read one, read what Sida has authored.
Now on skills for a second. I tell you what we're doing. We started Accenture Academy here. We're celebrating one year. We're taking fresh graduates, putting through batches 50 at a time. Working on cyber, data and AI, enterprise functions, we're putting them through three months of classroom training, three months of on‑the‑job training and some we're sending to offices outside of Saudi. We have to figure out how to keep them at Accenture once I'm done through all of this and that's how we're building skills and we offered this to our clients and anyone in the ecosystem who wants to be part of this as well.
Because it's not like you skill someone and then it's done. Right. It's the technology that is evolving so fast that this needs to be continuous process. And it has to be built into every organization and every government entity, right, in terms of the culture of that entity or organization. You've got to keep doing it. It's not just a one‑time thing. You've got to get people to a level, and then technology is evolving so fast it has to change, and it has to be part of the culture.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Thank you for highlighting that, Omar. It's good to hear about the Accenture Academy and the commitment Accenture has in building that next level of Saudi workforce.
I think, Wael, I think SITE has its own strategic agenda around empowering the Saudi as well ‑‑
>> WAEL ALFATTOUH: I just want to touch on this. SITE is 100% Saudi company, has always taken on responsibility, social responsibility towards training our people and getting them up to speed with what they need to do. So, in the field that we're in, we do get the question. Right. The question is what if you train them and they leave? My answer to that is what if we don't train them and they stay? Leaving is not an issue because you're not losing what you've invested. What we did when we train someone and they go somewhere else, they're a better, more productive, more informed individual. It's contributing to the ecosystem and to the field that we're in. And that is a win for us. That's not a lose.
Retention issues is something that all technology companies struggle with, and we just get ‑‑ we continue to examine how we can get better about providing the right environment for our people to want to stay. And then when they are ready to try something new, we're supporting them to try something new because at the end of the day, it's all going in this environment.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Absolutely. Thanks. It's very encouraging to see that premiere local companies as well as some of the global giants, they both have skill development at the core of their cooperate strategy when it comes to the Kingdom.
So, we've spoken a bit about relation, spoken a bit about skills. I think one of the other challenges that stands out from the local market standpoint is the cost of it. Right. I would like to hear from you, Muath. Obviously, a government entity, a small or medium enterprise, we have heard consistent challenges around the cost and budget constraints when it comes to deploying the end‑to‑end solutions both with the initial cost as well as ongoing maintenance cost.
I would like to hear from you, how can organizations and policymakers work together to create those cost‑effective models and incentives to make these technologies accessible?
>> MUATH ALGHAMDI: I think cost and ‑‑ it's very interesting. When you look at, for example, what the bank is doing, those are entities who are trying to help SMEs and startups focus on their businesses and putting the burden, of course, on the site.
Now, what we are doing as private sector, and I think this goes along with most of the large private sectors is that we're partnering with those entities. We're partnering to build solutions that are driven fully towards the small and medium enterprises. These solutions are taken ‑‑ take into consideration the cost factors as well as the enablement that we do for our end users.
I think, again, dialogue is very important, talking to other organizations within the same sector and trying to find common ground within regulators, regulatory, and policymakers is amazing. I think the cost issue by the way is not just SMEs. It's also I think government is also trying to be more efficient in terms of how they conduct business. So, this discussion, this dialogue is very important, and we if the private sector are key players when it comes to that cost, and we are doing our part, and I think the second part is also ‑‑
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: I agree. The days of the digital experiment, the big bang of digital. With all of the measures in place. Again, a testament to the Kingdom as well, there is a lot of scrutiny around how to optimize the budgets. So very well articulated Muath. By the way, guys, we're almost out of time. I'll turn to Mauricio and then come back to you all for a closing statement. This is what we anticipated that we would run out of time. But Mauricio, based on the panelist's insight, you heard about the challenges that the Saudi market faces. I want to get your perspective from Latin. Do you see similar challenges there, or is it a completely different set of challenges and maybe something for us to learn and reflect on from your insights here.
>> MAURICIO HERNANDEZ: To summarize in time, I would say that local technology, efficiency and equal access are what is concerning Latin. Also, training is very important. Dialogue before regulators and more ample sense of providing best practices and general guidelines is a huge weight in all of this that will be crucial.
Finally, just to understand that just to show you that also it's important for regulatory and advisory boards. So, implementing industry, all of these day‑to‑day changes that we are facing in technology.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Thank you. Thank you for articulating ‑‑ that's very heavy and a lot to unpack from that, but I appreciate that in the interest of time. That's a great summary.
All right, folks, we are almost there at the end, so we have covered a wide range of themes in this session, and given your experience and the key role that your organizations are playing in supporting the adoption of digital technologies in the kingdom, what would your recommendations be to help accelerate the country's modernization efforts with digital technologies. I know it's a very open‑ended question, but if there is one key take away that you would like our audience both with us this morning and also the ones that tuned in digitally, to walk away with what would that one key thing be? Over to you.
>> I'm going to steal one that probably search agrees on is people. I know you hear it all the time. I don't think it can be emphasized enough. Generally, everything that is being powered right now is being powered by the effort, the energy, the passion of the people that are in the field. And with technology, every field is a technology field. Every field is a digitalization area, so continue, and this has been amazing, and the direction that the government has taken and the contribution of the private sector into that responsibility is ‑‑ is showing results. We see the difference. We see the change, so we're doing something right. And I'm just excited to see it continue.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Great way to conclude, Wael. Thank you for your contributions to the panel. Omar, any final concluding remarks from you.
>> OMAR BOULOS: I'll say two. Because Wael said one. (laughter) I'll say this, lead with value, and I'll just leave it at that. It's important to understand why we're doing something and what the value comes in.
And then on talent let me just make this comment because I think it's important. To me, it's not just about the talent today. It's about in 10 years from now when we look back. I think all of us here in the ecosystem have an obligation to make sure that the talent that's taken us through the transformation, regardless of where they sit, is in the country. This cannot be something we can port and then export. It's got to be something that we collectively build, and then it's here. And it doesn't matter where it's here, because then they can answer the questions of why things have happened. And there is many examples of when transformations happen, and then 10 years from now, no one is here to say how this thing happened. So, I would say, lead with value. And not talent today, but we've got to figure out how we build the talent that is here for tomorrow.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Thanks a lot, Omar. I love the futuristic, future‑looking, long‑term remarks there. Muath?
>> MUATH ALGHAMDI: So, I think open dying lo. I think has to listen to private sector. I think this is very important. Eventually the end solution is going to be cooperated by both, the private sector as well as the government sector, so I think open dialogue, open discussions, meeting between government sector and private sector is extremely important. I cannot emphasize that. I think people as well as standards is important, but as important as those is also the open discussions between both parties.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. Mauricio, why don't you have the last word as our special guest. You've heard a lot over the last couple of days in Riyadh. What will the last final remarks be?
>> MAURICIO HERNANDEZ: My remarks will be let's technologically be open to the world. Let's try to find common bases and common spaces to get into the 2030 goals.
>> HAMZA NAQSHBANDI: Fantastic. I think that's a fantastic way to conclude. Clearly across the Kingdom, digital agendas have long been seen as necessary underpinnings of economic growth, and from what we've heard today, I think the digital aspirations of economy are taking shape full stream. And I think just augmented something that Wael said. What's happening in the Kingdom is undermining the contentional motions of how Saudi businesses are structured, how firms interact and how consumers obtain services, good, and information.
With that, I would like to conclude the session. Big hands to the panel. I hope you found the insights useful and insightful. It's been a pleasure. Have a great day, folks. Thank you.
(Applause).
>> Hello, everyone. Please kindly stay in the same room for the next session that starts in the next several minutes, a judicial engagement session, inaugural with the support of the IGF Secretariat. Thank you so much.