RIYADH, 6 March 2008 — As many as 48 national and international companies from the Kingdom will establish themselves in the capital’s own Silicon Valley, called the Riyadh Knowledge City, coming up on an area of 1.2 million square meters near King Saud University.

Mezyad M. Alterkawi, a board member of the Riyadh Technology Valley (RTV), said the project is part of the King Saud University’s ambitious project to create a knowledge corridor in line with the vision of the Kingdom’s leadership.

“It is inside our campus,” he said. “Funds have been allocated for this project, which is close to many knowledge-provider institutions like KACST, SASO and the King Abdullah Financial District.” Located east of KSU, the site will be within easy reach of the airport, paving the way for the establishment of the Riyadh Knowledge City.

A unique feature of the city is that it will be open to all companies from any country. This and other aspects of the RTV were discussed at a meeting held at the headquarters of the Arriyadh Development Authority (ADA), one of the major partners. Others expected to join in are the King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), the Riyadh Municipality, Saudi Aramco and SABIC.

Alterkawi said all companies would have their representatives in that corridor, which would serve as an information tank enabling anybody to feed into it. In other words, the project will serve two purposes — as a knowledge pool fed by valuable information and ideas from its members. At the same time, it will rely on the expertise of the companies to generate their own ideas, which could be translated into a high-end IT product.

Asked about the membership criteria, he said anyone could become a member of the corridor and seek any information that is available. Alternatively, one could provide information to it and earn credit. Alterkawi described it as an innovative concept to encourage people to come forward with marketable ideas they may have and thus become eligible for financial incentives.

“It allows people with access to valuable information to pump it out into the tank instead of keeping it locked within themselves. The more information you pump in, the more points you collect, and the greater will be your financial reward.”

It is a win-win situation for both sides. Those sharing marketable ideas will be rewarded for what they are worth. The RTV will also benefit by harnessing their business potential. The whole project represents the concept of value creation through alliances and partnerships, which was the theme of last week’s Jeddah Economic Forum.

“We don’t want people to become members of this knowledge corridor when they are already scientists. We would like them to join us when they are on their way to becoming a scientist. So the idea is to tap brilliant young people endowed with the talent to become a scientist. Revenue-generating ideas will also be harnessed through a selective advertising campaign offering incentives to those with innovative ideas,” the RTV official said.

As Alterkawi put it: “The knowledge corridor will work in partnership with companies and the people. Our studies suggest that when this corridor receives information in terms of revenue-generating business ideas, not only will the Corridor benefit in the process but so will the people feeding it with information. That money will go to a specific fund, which could continue to swell with the inflow and implementation of such ideas.”