RIYADH, 7 March 2007 — Network Appliance (NetApp) opened a new office in the Kingdom Tower in the capital yesterday. “The new office gives NetApp a physical presence in the biggest single market in the Middle East enabling the company to better serve the storage and data management needs of enterprise customers in this country, “ Sulaiman Al-Assaf, managing director of the new office, told Arab News. “We are very excited about this new office in the Saudi capital ,” Martyn Molnar, regional area director MENA at NetApp, said.
“By opening up an office here, we are further increasing our commitment to local customers and partners. We believe that a permanent local presence is vital to enabling us to effectively serve and meet the challenging demands of data-intensive industries such as oil and gas.”
which are particularly well developed in the Middle East.”
“ The office in Saudi Arabia is NetApp’s second branch in this region. The company’s MENA operations are run in Dubai where there has been an office since 2002. NetApp’s main focus in MENA is on the oil and gas, financial services, public sector and telecommunications industries.”
D. Patrick Linehan, senior vice president and general manager of Network Appliance for Europe, Middle East and Africa, said the Kingdom was chosen as the second station for Network Appliance since Saudi Arabia is the fastest growing country in terms of financial, commercial and communication services.”
The Kingdom holds 45 percent of the overall market among the 16 Middle Eastern countries,” he added. He pointed out that the Kingdom’s market is estimated at $500 million.” The global growth rate is only 16 percent.
