Kingdom spends SR150 billion on ICT in 2015

The Kingdom has spent SR120 billion for development of telecommunications and information technology sector during the year 2015, King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) President Prince Dr. Turki bin Saud bin Mohammed Al-Saud has said.
The prince was inaugurating the Saudi Arabian High Performance Computing Conference (SAHPC) and Exhibition at the KACST headquarters on Tuesday. 
The event sponsored by the KACST, was held in cooperation with the Saudi Aramco, number of international universities and specialized companies that are related to Information and Technology. 
The president pointed out that the Kingdom the largest investor in ICT in the region and it is one of the ten in spending in the relevant sector in the globe. 
The Kingdom has one of the 500 fastest computers in the world, including the high-performance computer (hump), which the KACST has achieved. It was also ranked the second place among the most energy-efficient computers in November 2012.
The prince said the world is going through a revolution to form a huge data base that will rapidly increase in the coming years. He said the purpose of the conference is to identify specialists government agencies, universities and research centers and the private sector in the Kingdom of the tools available in the field of computing, high-performance and can provide solutions to many of the business through simulation and modeling, data analysis in vital areas such as defense and security, climate and weather, oil and gas, and vital information.
The SAHPC forum is a premier regional event at which HPC industry leaders, application developers, scientific and engineering users, educators, and economic and institutional planners network on the opportunities and challenges of supercomputing. 
The SAHPC Forum creates national "critical mass" that enfolds local HPC communities in Saudi Arabia, facilitating exchanges and fostering new collaborations in business, research, and education. It also helps develop a national identity for the Kingdom as an emerging international power in supercomputing.