King Abdullah Economic City development plan on track

King Abdullah Economic City (KAEC), the world’s largest privately-funded new city, has announced it signed contracts worth $43 million (SR1.6 billion) in 2016.

In 2016 KAEC signed contracts with developers and service providers covering the full range of the city’s operations. Approximately 30 percent of the total volume of contracts were for developments in the Industrial Valley and another 40 percent were for residential developments. Eighty-eight percent of contracts were signed with Saudi-based firms. The announced contracts do not include contracts and agreements with companies that have investments in KAEC.

“KAEC is continuing to grow and our development plan remains firmly on track,” said Fahd Al-Rasheed, group CEO and managing director of KAEC. “Our status as a privately-funded development has been an important factor in our performance and our strong cash position has allowed us to continue to invest steadily across our activities toward achieving KAEC sustainable development”.

Value of projects

“The value of projects under implementation in KAEC is worth more than$1.6 billion (SAR6 billion) and that does not include the implementation of contracts in the King Abdullah Port and Industrial and commercial companies’ investments in the city,” Al Rasheed added.

KAEC has registered more than 2,700 vendors to work on the development of city since 2007 and most of the vendors are national companies and organizations.

King Abdullah Economic City is the largest privately-funded new city in the world. Situated on the west coast of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, KAEC covers an area of 181 square kilometers of land, approximately the size of Washington DC. KAEC comprises King Abdullah Port, the Coastal Communities residential districts, the Haramain Railway district and the Industrial Valley. The city is under development by Emaar, The Economic City, a publicly listed Saudi joint-stock company established in 2006.

This report was first published in Saudi Gazette on Feb. 5, 2017.