Amr Banaja has been the CEO of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority (GEA) since August 2018.

Speaking at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s 75th anniversary celebrations on Thursday, Banaja said that the GEA would work to build partnerships with firms in the private sector, to facilitate investment that could create over 200,000 jobs in the region by 2030.

He said: “The GEA will build new partnerships with private companies, and create seven new entertainment venues in Jeddah, Dammam, Riyadh and the Eastern Province, to give the companies a platform from which to prosper and expand.”

He received a bachelor’s in economics from Boston College in the US in 1998, and later attended executive training courses at the London School of Business and Finance in 2017, and Columbia University in 2018.

After returning to Saudi Arabia, he worked in a variety of sectors, including real estate, financial services and consumer goods. He also worked in several other Gulf nations, for organizations including Sama Dubai, National Commercial Bank, Unilever and Gillette.

In 2011 he joined the Saudi Economic and Development Co. (SEDCO) as a senior vice president.