The Sporting Events Taking Place In Saudi Arabia And What It Means For The Events Industry
In recent years, especially since 2016, Saudi Arabia has been rapidly advancing in the entertainment and events space in a bid to achieve its 2030 vision – ‘Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 economic diversification initiative’ – where Travel, Tourism, and Entertainment is a huge priority.
This is of course huge for the events industry, as we overlap into a lot of sectors, the main one being the entertainment sector.
This is only the beginning too. As stated in the International Trade Administration, Saudi Arabia has “pledged to invest up to $64 billion by 2028 to develop Saudi Arabia’s domestic entertainment sector” – an astronomical amount!
Some key moments in recent years being:
- Ending of the 30-year ban on cinemas (2018)
- 45 movie theaters in Saudi Arabia by the end of 2021
- The Red Sea International Film Festival
- Plans to build a ‘media city’ – to create a ‘multiservice media ecosystem to support and enable content and talent creation’
Saudi Arabia’s vision is to transform into a major global travel destination, which is why we have seen more high-profile sporting events, from huge boxing bouts to the F1 in the region; and will continue too!
The huge investment in these industries and sectors has seen a huge progression in the events taking place in the region and this can too be seen in the success of the ‘Saudi Seasons‘ – which we have also been a part of – which is an annual series of festivals to suit themes.
Saudi Arabia has seen more than 2,500 events to date, drawing well over 80 million attendees. A huge positive impact this has had on Saudi Arabia is the creation of more than 100,000 jobs for locals.
For their tourism vision – Saudi Arabia plans to welcome over 100 million visitors annually by 2030, seeing numerous initiatives come into play, including an e-visa system for 49 different countries.
Sports Events In Saudi Arabia
We’ve already seen some of the world’s biggest sporting events come to Saudi Arabia. Key events being:
- Boxing: Anthony Joshua vs Andy Ruiz (both bouts), Anthony Joshua vs Oleksandr Usyk
- F1: Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
- Football: 2x Italian Super Cup finals, Spanish Super Cup
- Golf: Saudi International
- WWE: = WWE ‘Crown Jewel’ event
- and plenty of others including motorsports, snooker and more.
These are just a few key sports events that have taken place in Saudi Arabia so far and a lot more are scheduled for the region.
Upcoming Sports Events In Saudi Arabia
There are a lot of exciting sports events coming up in Saudi Arabia too – here are some to look forward to!
- 14th-16th October 2022: Golf – LIV Golf Invitational Series
- 5th November 2022: WWE Crown Jewel (Roman Reigns vs Logan Paul)
- 9th -11th November 2022: Golf – Ladies European Tour
- 16th November 2022: Football – Internationals – Saudi Arabia vs Croatia
- 10th January 2023: Football – Spanish Super Cup Semi-Final – Real Madrid vs Valencia
- 10th January 2023: Football – Spanish Super Cup Semi-Final – Real Betis vs Barcelona
- 26th-27th January 2023: Formula E – Diriyah E-Prix
- 25th February 2023: Horse Racing – Saudi Cup
- 18th-19th March 2023: Formula 1 – Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
See all of the upcoming sports events happening in Saudi Arabia
See other events happening in Saudi Arabia
What Does This Mean For The Events Industry?
The events industry, as mentioned above, covers such a range of sectors – we work with clients in every sector imaginable. And with Saudi Arabia focussing on travel, tourism, and entertainment – the events industry will be working with individuals and companies across all three of these sectors.
According to Statista, “Revenue in the Event Tickets segment is projected to reach US$342.30m in 2022. Revenue is expected to show an annual growth rate (CAGR 2022-2027) of 6.52%, resulting in a projected market volume of US$469.40m by 2027.” – which of course is a huge figure in the events industry.
More specifically – with the number of sports events coming to the Saudi region – this of course will have a huge impact on the events industry – and a positive one too! We have and will be very busy in this region for the foreseeable future.
With sports events comes things like fan zones, activations and outdoor events – which cover a wide range of entertainment, displays and more.
Fan zones are a must for any sports events – especially on the scale of the sports events taking place in Saudi Arabia. These are a fantastic way of boosting the number of attendees to these events and of course fan engagement at the same time.
This has a huge boost on how these events perform in terms of trending on social media and becoming a global spectacle – people love to post on their social media profiles of these types of things.
These fan zones are only getting bigger, more advanced and impactful as each event is always a step further into being bigger and better! It’s a never-ending competition as each event has to be better than the last.
The impact of the focus on the three sectors travel, tourism and entertainment has already had a huge impact on the events industry. According to Vision 2030, entertainment venues have increased from 154 to 277 in just three years.
This is a huge increase over such a short period of time and will provide endless opportunities for future events in the region.
Delving further into the statistics of the impact this focus on the three pillars has had – over 2,000 events have now been hosted in the region with well over 46,000,0000 visitors!
Backed with the huge investment – the pledge of $64b by 2028 – this will only increase dram
What Are The Limitations? What Are The Challenges?
Initially, there were a lot more limitations than there are today.
For example, the processing time for visas used to be at least two weeks – this has now been reduced to just five minutes thanks to the region’s digital transformation. Therefore making it easier for last-minute events and of course making it easier to visit.
Another obstacle is the skills gap created from the rapid growth of the entertainment sector. The region has not had the experience in this sector to have produced a large number of experienced experts in the sector – therefore leaving it to international companies.
However, as time goes on this is becoming better and better. Saudi Arabia has brought in international events companies to fill the gap. However, they’re also asking these companies, like ourselves, to provide training facilities to provide employment for locals and provide long term revenue – locals creating their own events companies and own staff.
Lastly – infrastructure has had to catch up. It’s not unusual for events to be scheduled in stadiums, venues and more that have not been built yet, including the transport links to these places. So there are a lot more moving parts around planning these events.
A lot of events are currently held in and around hotels where transport links and other infrastructure are already established, which has had a positive effect on hotel chains – they have been expanding rapidly.
The events sector in Saudi Arabia is without a doubt on the rise and there is so much potential in this – we can’t wait to see what events are coming up in the region.
Get In Touch With Us Today.
With nearly 20 years of Event Management insight, working with world-renowned Clients we'll help you create your Dream Event.
Get in Touch