Dr. Khulood Almani recently became the first Saudi to be appointed as a senator of the World Business Angels Investment Forum, an affiliated partner of the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion.

Almani is a professor and expert in digital transformations in AI systems, entrepreneurship, innovation and start-ups, and a founding member of the Saudi Association for Engineering Innovation and Research at King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology.

Born in the US, she completed her early education in California and part of her middle schooling in Virginia.

Almani obtained a Ph.D. in computer science from Loughborough University in the UK. In 2018, in cooperation with the university’s research center, she created a Virtual Tech Accelerator digital platform for SMEs.

She is a founding member and investor in Forward Angel Investment along with a group of partners from Saudi Arabia and the wider Gulf. The venture provides financial support, training and partnerships to digital entrepreneurs and startups worldwide.

She also worked for several years as a professor at King Saud University and Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University in Riyadh.

Almani’s company, HKB Tech, has reportedly partnered with a foreign company that has pedigree in implementing AI projects, smart cities, virtual reality, augmented reality, and metaverse technology.

Almani has won a number of awards locally and globally. She was ranked first in the world among the top 32 thought leaders in the field of technology, AI, robotics and data science by the Mobile World Congress 2023 in March. Last year, she was listed among the 50 most powerful global thought leaders in AI and was awarded the Global Technical Thought Leadership Medal.

In a statement to Arab News, Almani said: “I hope to support the Saudi government on the current leadership of artificial intelligence by creating the appropriate ecosystem for these entities and companies to thrive and grow.”

She noted that this will provide new technology graduates with greater career opportunities and will also improve the quality of life in large cities such as Riyadh and Jeddah by “meeting the real daily needs of citizens and visitors.”