At the Fourth Industrial Revolution Forum in Asharqia Chamber:
Saudi Aramco offers investment opportunities for small and medium enterprises.
Al-Thaali: $ 25 billion in Aramco procurement contracts from national companies.
Al-Khalidi: Fourth Industrial Revolution offers promising opportunities for pioneers.
Al-Falih: We aim to increase the purchasing rates of national companies.
Abu Sharifa: promising opportunities in the fields of electronic activities.
Saudi Aramco's Director of Industrial Development and Strategic Supply, Abdullah Al-Tha'ali, said that the value of the promising investment opportunities in the field of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which the company provides through Iktifa'a program, is of more than $ 1.5 billion, includes big data, and robotics.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution Forum was organized by Asharqia Chamber in cooperation with Aramco at the headquarters of the Chamber in Dammam on Sunday 13/ May/ 2018. Al-Tha'ali added that the Fourth Industrial Revolution is the revolution that was considered by participants in the Davos Economic Forum as a "tsunami technological progress" that will change a lot in human life. He pointed out that Aramco has gone a long way in evaluating the techniques of this revolution and how to benefit from it, and even developed a comprehensive strategy for its implementation.
He emphasized that the company's Iktifa'a program is an incubator for local investments, especially small and medium enterprises. It aims to enhance the total value added of the supply sector and contribute to advancing the national economy by opening up new horizons for local investment, increasing Saudization in the production of materials and services, which is supporting the Kingdom's Vision 2030. He said that the program achieved 45% of the local content by the end of 2017 at the level of companies with which Saudi Aramco deals with. The program also contributed to increasing the percentage of purchases from local factories to reach 50% during 2017, the highest percentage achieved in the history of Saudi Aramco. It also added the requirements of a program of sufficient contracts for the purchase of materials and services with a total value of up to $ 25 billion.
Opportunities in the digital age
Abdul Hakim bin Hamad Al-Ammar Al Khalidi, the Chairman of the Board of Asharqia Chamber, added, "The Fourth Industrial Revolution that was launched at the beginning of the new millennium, and its full digital transformation in various industrial and service fields, marks a new era in which emerging technologies and digital strategies are emerging rapidly. This undoubtedly affects the whole industrial system in the country, which requires all of us to work to pursue this revolution by the formulation of advanced business models and the introduction of new implementation mechanisms under the rules of competitiveness based on the requirements of the digital age through providing solutions and new ways to achieve long-term gains in efficiency and production." He pointed out "there are great opportunities accompanying the Fourth Industrial Revolution available to the pioneers of the local component, which can provide thousands of opportunities for the national workforce."
Iktifa'a program services
For his part, Eng. Ahmed Al-Falih said that Aramco has been gradually integrated into the Saudization programs, which started with the support of traders and suppliers of goods, and then moved to support service providers. It concluded with the firm support of the manufacturers in the Kingdom. After that, it sought to achieve a boom in the level of Saudization program that was the launch of the program "Iktifa'a" as an organized process to support local content and compatible and supportive of the vision of the Kingdom 2030.
Al-Falih said that the aim of the program is to double Saudi Aramco's purchase of local goods and services to 70% by 2021, to raise the export rate to 30%, thereby to enable the sustainability of the economy, the supply chain and the energy sector, as well as to create thousands of professional and functional jobs for the national workforce. He noted that "Iktifa'a" is not a unit of measurement but a strategic program and mission for Saudi Aramco. It helps to establish a competitive Saudi industrial base on a global level.
As for the advantages of the program "Iktifa'a," Al-Falih said that it includes all service for providers and manufacturers. It has been developed jointly with contractors. It is the easiest program compared to other international methods as it measures the value added at the level of the company, not only the product. It is also ensuring the principle of transparency that "we aim to follow during the stages of the evaluation process." He pointed out that the evaluation of service of providers and strategic manufacturers will be annually through one of the auditing companies announced as a third party from outside the company to give companies the full privacy of their financial information.
About Iktifa'a, Al-Falih pointed out that it has become a major demand for business with Saudi Aramco, "so we are always keen to encourage our suppliers to invest in our future investment plans, which reach SR 1.4 trillion at an annual rate of SR 140 billion."
Promising investment opportunities
Under the title "the fourth industrial revolution, a deeper look", Mr. Mahmoud Abu Sharifa from Aramco talked about many programs that constitute a fertile area for investment opportunities for small and medium enterprises under the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The most prominent of which is the e-security market, which reached $ 13.2 billion in 2015 in the Middle East, and will reach $ 55.7 billion by 2022, at a CAGR of 23%. The Saudi market is no exception; its spending on the e-security sector is growing at a CAGR of 21.2 percent. Thus, there are opportunities to localize cyber security in the Kingdom and small and medium enterprises can provide programs to prevent and detect attacks under the Fourth Industrial Revolution (cloud computing). Therefore, cloud computing has become, as Abu Sharifa said, one of the latest trends in information technology, and re-way the commercial companies in marketing their offers and products, and how to develop their strategies. He suggested that the Kingdom's cloud computing market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 16% and total spending on this sector is expected to reach $ 2.5 billion in 2025. He pointed out that there are Saudization opportunities available at all stages of the value chain of cloud computing as small and medium enterprises can help to localize the manufacture of certain components for storage and localization of programs.
Another area is high-performance computing, which is related to the use of parallel programming to run intensive computer applications faster. It id used in the Kingdom and around the world in several other fields including Earth Sciences, Climate, Aviation, Development, Military Manufacturing and other fields such as physics, chemistry and engineering. He expected the Kingdom's high-performance computing market to grow at a compound growth rate of 9% per year to reach $ 170 million by 2025.
In addition, Abu Sharifa addressed the idea of the mobile solutions, which are used in many applications, including oil and gas. He said that the spending on these applications in the Kingdom at present is about 300 million dollars. It is expected to rise by 11.2% annually to reach about $ 780 million by 2025. Saudization opportunities are available in many areas in this regard too.
He also talked about big data and advanced analysis as a promising area and is expected to become a major factor in cost reduction and performance improvement.
It is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of around 14% to reach $ 716 million by 2025. He stressed the existence of the possibility of small and medium enterprises to help in the localization of the manufacture of certain components of the server and storage.
In addition, he referred to the idea of the three-dimensional printing, which has been used by many companies and achieved a remarkable improvement in many of its activities. He expected that the compound annual growth rate of the 3D printing market in the Middle East to rise by nearly 16% to reach $ 3.123 million by 2025.
There is availability of Saudization opportunities in most stages of the value chain of the three-dimensional printing, but the highest is the manufacture of raw materials.
He noted that the Kingdom is the best country in the petrochemical materials used in the printing three-dimensional.
He referred to robots and drones, and their use in various investment fields, as he said that sales of robots grow by 8% until 2020, most of them will be in the industrial field. He believes that there are good opportunities for robotics to be used in basic metal manufacturing processes. There is also the possibility of using Internet robots "bots" to help save time and effort in many applications. He pointed out that Saudi Aramco recently launched an electronic check system, a robotic device with motor and ultrasonic sensors. An unmanned aerial vehicle was also used by Aramco to test burners by optical and thermal imaging means.
He predicted that the market for robots used in the industry would grow at a compound rate of about 15% until 2025, which is bringing the number of robots to about 11 thousand robots in 2025.
Electronic Market
On the Saudi electronic market, Engineer Adel Al Shahrani from Saudi Aramco presented a paper on the vision and plans of the company for the e-shopping program and how to benefit from the commercial movement in the Eastern region and in the Kingdom in general. He pointed to the growth of electronic commerce in the G20 countries at a rate of $ 4.2 trillion, and the global growth rate of $ 8 trillion.
On Saudi Aramco's Saudi online market, Al-Shahrani said, "This platform will set Aramco as a leading organization in the supply chain region and will serve all regions of the Kingdom in terms of expanding the scope of solutions and industrial practices for contractors as well as other national companies." The e-shopping site will also be the main hub for enabling real-time collaboration and data exchange between partners. He pointed out that the e-market is the common platform and framework that brings together the company in the business sector, including the customer base and the national and global supply base.
He explained that the site would be supportive of many national programs, including programs of Saudization. He noted that the development of the e-shopping market will increase the size of the desired benefit and will achieve growth in the sector fully. He added that the site was launched in the second quarter of 2018, as planned, with some expansion to the national e-market in the third quarter 2018, and the final phase of the expansion of the e-shopping market to the oil and gas companies and petrochemicals in the GCC in the regional e-market would be done in 2019.
Al-Shahrani said the e-shopping site is a major shift that will change the way business is conducted, which aims to ensure participation in effective sources and avoid delays in the approval process after June 1, 2018.
Dialogue session
The meeting ended with a dialogue session with Aramco officials and a member of the Board of Directors of Asharqia Chamber, Ibrahim Al-Sheikh, who confirmed Saudi Aramco's intention to settle and stimulate the local component of the owners of small and medium enterprises. He stressed the importance of keeping abreast of the global technological changes and the present fourth industrial revolution in the fields of industrial technology.
For their part, Aramco officials stressed that despite the limited potential of local manufacturers and suppliers with regard to the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the opportunities it offers, it initiated the establishment of the Fourth Industrial Revolution platform to guide local companies towards future related investments, and made available on the site of the adequacy of all information related to this revolution along with the products of technology that they need. They pointed out that Aramco's needs of the Industrial Revolution have now been decided to move to a new stage in enriching the knowledge about the 4th Industrial Revolution and its needs among the pioneers of the local component of small and medium enterprises, as well as among Saudi youth in cooperation with local universities to open specialized colleges in the fields of Information Analysis and Information Security.
Abdul Hakim Al-Ammar Al-Khalidi, Chairman of Al-Sharqia Chamber, honored the Director of Industrial Development and Strategic Supply Department of Saudi Aramco, Eng. Abdullah Al-Thaali with a commemorative shield.
