Saudi Arabia’s information and communications technology (ICT) spend is expected to reach $32.9 billion in 2022, a year-on-year growth of 2.3 percent, the International Data Corp. forecasted.
The Saudi ICT sector expanded 8 percent between 2019 and 2021, to reach a value of $32.1 billion.
This was revealed during the 8th edition forum, hosted jointly by ICT and the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC), to tackle the current ICT market and Saudi Arabia’s digital transformation journey.
Hamza Naqshbandi, IDC’s associate vice president for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, described the Saudi ICT sector as one of the most rapidly growing markets in the region.
“The Kingdom’s response to the pandemic was one of the strongest and most robust that any economy had to the pandemic,” said IDC’s associate vice president for Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.”
“IDC research shows that the Kingdom was way ahead of the curve in terms of its preparedness and response to the pandemic, and the pioneering Vision 2030 initiative has been a key facilitator of that success,” Hamza Naqshbandi added.
Since 2017, Saudi Arabia has added 37,000 telecommunication towers covering about 99 percent of the Kingdom’s area, with the value of its ICT and postal markets exceeding 140 billion riyals ($37 billion) in 2021.
In a global context, IDC forecasted that worldwide ICT spending will increase from $3.86 trillion in 2021 to $5.34 trillion in 2025.
