Qiddiya confirms sovereign funding for $40B “city for play”

Qiddiya officials say the $40 billion “city for play” project will rely comfortably on Saudi sovereign funding for years, despite recent calls for greater involvement from the private sector.

“We recognise that creating a brand-new city from scratch in the desert is a sovereign undertaking,” Qiddiya Investment Company Vice Chairman Morgan Parker said at the Cityscape conference held in Riyadh last week.

He added that building a city the size of Las Vegas will “take some time.” Qiddiya is located outside Riyadh with a motor racing track, 12 theme parks, 40 sports venues and 27 entertainment attractions.

The city expects to develop around 120 hotels with 41,000 rooms over the next 20 years.

The Six Flags Qiddiya amusement park held its soft-opening earlier this month, with an official launch expected on New Year’s Eve. 

Emirates Development Bank to provide billions in new financing to private sector

Emirates Development Bank (EDB) is loosening the purse strings, aiming to massively increase financing to the private sector by 2026.

The bank announced it will provide financing worth AED 30 billion ($8.2 billion) by 2026, targeting the 13,500 companies operating in key sectors for the UAE’s diversification efforts, including renewable energy, industry, advanced technology, healthcare and food security, according to Shaker Zainal, Business Finance Director at EDB.

On the sidelines of the Make it in the Emirates Forum on Monday, he said the bank has allocated $1.36 billion in financing for industrial projects so far this year.

Access to financing is one of the top hurdles for small- and medium-sized enterprises looking to grow in the Gulf. To address the access to credit or equity financing gap, development banks across the region have cropped up in the last decade, with EDB launching in 2015.