RIYADH: US-based tech giant IBM employs a majority of Saudi nationals at its artificial intelligence lab in the Kingdom, underscoring the nation’s commitment to developing local talent.
It was disclosed during a panel titled “Bringing Tech to Life” on the opening day of LEAP 2025, Riyadh’s flagship technology event, held from Feb. 9-12 under the theme “Into New Worlds.”
Speaking at the discussion, IBM Chairman and CEO Arvind Krishna said: “Over 70 percent of our hires in (IBM’s AI and R&D lab) are Saudi nationals, not expats.”
Launched at LEAP 2024, IBM’s $200 million Software Lab in Riyadh supports Vision 2030 by driving digital innovation, job creation, and global tech solutions, aligning with the Kingdom’s pledge to invest $100 billion in its technology sector.
Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Al-Swaha, addressing industry leaders and aspiring innovators, stressed the importance of understanding market shifts.
“I think no leader in the industry can really help educate all of us — leaders in the room, the youth, the women, the talent — about picking up market transitions and where the market is heading,” he said.
Krishna acknowledged the growing excitement around AI but noted that for numerical purposes the technology has been in use for two decades.
He also predicted a seismic shift in computing capabilities, with quantum computing expected to achieve a major breakthrough within the next two to three years.
“In three to five years, we will see something amazing on quantum computers,” he added.
A key transformation Krishna highlighted was in AI training costs, forecasting a dramatic reduction. “I believe the cost of training will become 1 percent — one over 100 of what it used to be. DeepSeek was a proof point of that,” he noted.
DeepSeek, a Chinese AI firm, gained rapid attention with its R1 large language model, released on Jan. 20 at a fraction of typical development costs.
Offered under an open-source license, DeepSeek-R1 quickly soared in popularity, with its AI assistant app topping Apple’s App Store and surpassing OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Its success triggered a stock market shakeup as investors reevaluated major US AI companies.
While large general-purpose AI models currently dominate the field, Krishna emphasized the potential of domain-specific models, which today account for just 1 percent of usage.
“All the fascination is with these large models that serve everybody, but we believe in the next three to four years, domain-specific models will make up over half of all deployed models,” he said.
LEAP 2025 aims to expand business networking and investment opportunities in the tech sector. The event plays a crucial role in Saudi Arabia’s goal of becoming a global technology hub, in line with Vision 2030’s economic diversification strategy.
