MUST-READS

• Doing business in Saudi Arabia: new opportunities surge under Saudi Vision 2030

  For reference to KSA laws and regulations, the National Center for Archives and Records (NCAR) regularly publishes these in both Arabic and English. NCAR is tasked with the management, preservation, and organisation of KSA’s historic documents and records. The business environment in KSA is rapidly evolving, becoming more dynamic and inclusive, particularly with efforts to promote gender equality. Businesses aiming to operate in the Kingdom must adhere to and respect its Islamic culture and customs.

• How Mahmoud Khalil became the face of Trump’s crackdown on campus protests

  When protests over the Israel-Hamas war took root on Columbia University’s campus last spring, Mahmoud Khalil became a familiar, outspoken figure in a student movement that soon spread to other U.S. colleges. The international-affairs graduate student was a fixture in and around the protest encampment on Columbia’s Manhattan campus, serving as a spokesperson and negotiator for demonstrators who deplored Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and pressed the Ivy League school to cut financial ties with Israel and companies that supported the war. Now that visibility has helped make him the face of President Donald Trump’s drive to punish what he calls antisemitic and “anti-American” campus protests. In the first publicly known arrest of the crackdown, federal immigration agents took Khalil, a legal U.S. resident married to an American citizen, from his apartment Saturday and held him for potential deportation.

• SIG and Yellow Door Energy partner on 2 MW Saudi Arabian project

  SIG, a European provider of sustainable building products, and UAE-based solar company Yellow Door Energy have launched a 2 MW solar project in Riyadh. Once complete, the installation will become one of Saudi Arabia’s first on-grid industrial solar projects connected directly to a manufacturing plant. The project is under the stewardship of the Saudi Authority for Industrial Cities and Technology Zones (MODON), ensuring that it is in-line with the country’s MODON Green Initiative to encourage renewable energy rollout in cities. Overall, the solar project is expected to reduce CO2 emissions by 1,300 metric tons per annum.

• PwC’s Consulting Ban From Saudi Fund Has Rivals Hunting for Work

  Managers at Deloitte and Ernst & Young have instructed staffers to prepare for more work in the kingdom, according to people familiar with their thinking. Some firms have already been invited to bid for contracts tied to some of the kingdom’s most prestigious and lucrative projects, including Neom and AlUla, according to one of the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is confidential. The Middle East region generated £1.97 billion ($2.5 billion) in revenue for PwC UK, the corporate entity that includes the region, in the 12 months to June 30. Saudi Arabia is the biggest and fastest-growing market for consulting within the Gulf, making up more than half of the $6 billion in regional revenue, according to the research firm Insights.

• Incredible ambition, but at what cost? Saudi gigaproject budget spirals

  Indeed, it's easy get lost in the deluge of information and rumors, but even the scaled-back version of Neom is insanely ambitious: the first phase of the Line is currently under construction and it will have a length of 2.4 km (1.5 miles), as well as a height of 500 m (1,640 ft). It will feature a mirrored exterior and will serve as home to 200,000 residents. It will also be topped by a rooftop stadium and is slated to be ready by 2030, in time for the FIFA World Cup soccer tournament being held there four years later.

• Saudi Investment Fund pays $3.5bn to capture Pokémon Go

  Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF) will pay $3.5bn (£2.7bn) to buy the gaming division of developer Niantic, whose titles include the hit mobile game Pokémon Go. The game involves players walking around in the real world to hunt the collectable creatures, which appear on their phone screens using augmented reality. Despite launching almost a decade ago, Pokémon Go is still amongst the highest-grossing mobile games in the world, with 30 million monthly players. The deal marks the latest step by Saudi Arabia to develop its gaming industry, which it has spent billions of pounds on in recent years. Niantic's other games, such as Monster Hunter Now and Pikmin Bloom, are also included in the acquisition, along with the people employed to make them. They will become part of Scopely Inc - which itself was bought by PIF subsidiary Savvy Games Group for $4.9bn in 2023. Scopely is one of the biggest names in mobile gaming, with its most successful title, Monopoly Go, being downloaded more than 50 million times and generating more than $3bn in revenue.

• Unpacking the Drivers of Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Policy

  At its core, Saudi Arabia's foreign policy orientation is grounded in the Kingdom’s economic program Vision 2030. For Vision 2030 to succeed, there is a clear awareness by the Saudi government that international partnerships and a stable geopolitical environment are essential. As the country works to reduce its dependence on oil and diversify its economy, foreign relations are not merely supplementary but a prerequisite for securing the investments, trade agreements, and stability needed for sustained economic growth. As Saudi Arabia seeks to establish itself as an attractive investment destination, diplomatic efforts help maintain an investment-friendly environment, assuring foreign investors of the country's security and stability.

• G7 foreign ministers meet in Canada amid tensions with Trump
  Foreign ministers of leading Western democracies meet in Canada on Thursday after seven weeks of rising tensions between U.S. allies and President Donald Trump over his upending of foreign policy on Ukraine and imposing of tariffs. The Group of Seven ministers from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States, along with the EU, meet in the remote tourist town of La Malbaie, nestled in the Quebec hills for two days of meetings that in the past have broadly been consensual on the issues they face. Top of the agenda for Washington's partners will be getting a debriefing on U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio's talks on Tuesday with Kyiv in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where Ukraine said it was ready to support a 30-day ceasefire deal.

• Russia’s high-flying gas exporter crippled as Europe stays away
  When the CEO of Russian state gas giant Gazprom, Alexei Miller, opened a lavish Italian palazzo-styled building in central St Petersburg to house the company's export arm 11 years ago, he augured a future funded by European sales. "This is symbolic," he said, referring to the modern new offices in Russia's most European city. "Europe will increasingly need Russian gas."  Instead, the opulent offices have come to symbolize Gazprom's rapid decline, dragged down by the almost total loss of European markets after the war in Ukraine ruptured Russia's ties with the West. Reeling under multi-billion-dollar losses and scrambling for savings, the company is now considering putting the palazzo up for sale along with other luxury properties it owns, according to a Gazprom executive and another source with knowledge of internal discussions at Gazprom.

• Eid al-Fitr: Employees, students in Saudi Arabia to enjoy long Eid holiday

  This year’s month of fasting began on March 1. The official Eid holiday in Saudi Arabia will start on Sunday March 30, meaning that employees will enjoy a long holiday with Friday, March 28, and Saturday, March 29, already off as weekend days. The Eid al-Fitr break will be extended to four days ending on Wednesday, April 2, with work resuming on Thursday, April 3. For students on the other hand, the break will begin on March 20 and studies will resume on April 6, according to the education ministry’s academic calendar. The actual date of the first day of Eid al-Fitr will be confirmed when the crecent moon is sighted.

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