Riyadh plans centre for live shows and sport

Saudi Arabia plans to set up an entertainment complex in Riyadh featuring live shows and sports activities in its latest venture to develop a local leisure industry, attract tourists and introduce broad social reforms.

Saudi Entertainment Ventures Company, a subsidiary of the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, will develop the 100,000 square metre complex. It will include cinemas, restaurants, water activities and family entertainment areas, the company said on its Twitter account, without disclosing the investment value.

“By 2020, a total of 20 entertainment complexes will be built around the kingdom,” the company tweeted.

Saudi Arabia is carrying out economic and social reforms to attract foreign investments and wean its economy off oil. Last year the kingdom staged its first Cirque du Soleil performance, hosted concerts by western entertainers such as David Guetta and Enrique Iglesias, announced plans for an opera house, lifted a 30-year ban on cinemas and allowed women to drive.

Developing a local entertainment industry is intended to redirect the flow of Saudi leisure spending abroad back into the kingdom. The new sector is part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 economic overhaul plan to diversify non-oil revenues, modernise society and create jobs.

The Public Investment Fund, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, created the company in 2017 with an initial capitalisation of 10 billion riyals (Dh9.79bn) to act as an investment arm in the kingdom’s entertainment sector. It hired former Disney executive Bill Ernest to run it.

PIF expects the company’s projects will serve more than 50 million visitors a year, create more than 22,000 direct jobs and contribute an estimated 8 billion riyals to the country’s gross domestic product by 2030.