RIYADH, 8 January 2003 — As many as 1,600 participants from the Arab world, including several from the Kingdom, will attend the first-ever Microsoft Developers Conference in the Middle East in Cairo next week.
Fahad Al-Sudairy, Microsoft’s marketing manager in Saudi Arabia, said the conference, from Jan. 13 to 15, is specially relevant to the Kingdom, which has 2,000 software and business developers out of 28,000 in the Arab world.
The three-day conference will discuss various aspects of IT applications. The details have been posted on the website www.microsoft.com.
Al-Sudairy said the conference is fully financed by Microsoft and the participants would not have to pay any fee.
Referring to Microsoft’s presence in the Kingdom, Al-Sudairy said it has the largest market share, although he would not disclose the details. He added that as part of their commitment to the Kingdom, Microsoft provided during the last two years over 60,000 computers to schools run by the Ministry of Education.
"These computers are equipped with the basic tools required for software developers, as the Education Ministry is keen to develop a cadre of qualified developers in the Kingdom," he said.
