Savvy Moves: Saudi Arabia’s Gaming Vision

hey folks and welcome to the deconstructor of fun podcast I'm your host Mishi katoff and in this episode we're going to talk about Saudi Arabia's ambition to create a gaming industry ecosystem so when we think about cities like Montreal Istanbul La Helsinki Tel Aviv and many others the audience of this podcast so you are probably thinking about moving ecosystems now this episode really tries to embark on a journey through Saudi Arabia's transformative gaming industry with Savvy games group CEO Brian Ward and Gerard miles an executive Head Hunter and a founder of mission one uh together we're going to explore the Kingdom's vision for 2030 and its ambition to establish a global gaming Hub fostering rapid industry growth in the Middle East and I find this conversation very interesting because when you think about growing and giving a really a birth to uh to an ecosystem

especially such an interesting ecosystem as gaming what would you do where would you start how would you do it now Saudi area of course has immense resources to do this and but nevertheless it's a challenge does an ecosystem come organically what can you do to um to support it to provide the right type of incentives and the right type of resources to u to make it happen so I hope you enjoyed this conversation I did learned a lot and um if you're watching this on YouTube it would be great to have you as a subscriber and if you're using any other platforms and you enjoy this conversation to give us a thumbs up a five star a like whatever the other the platform gives those are much appreciated and help us to um to get the uh the episodes to as many viewers as possible so without further Ado ladies and gentlemen Brian Ward and Gerard miles

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Ryan Gerard H welcome to the podcast thank you thanks good to be here so so to to kick it off I'll I'll do a quick introduction jard as a returning guest Ryan here for the first time to see you and um yeah just a quick introduction so Brian Ward CEO of Savvy games um you been a CEO of Savvy for near only three years before that you had got a really storied career in leadership positions at EA micros soft Activision and you've also found it your own Studio or your own company called aut interactive it's a skill-based real money mobile games company uh that you operate as a CO for I believe 12 years so Brian welcome to the podcast thanks Mich I really uh happy to be here thanks a lot uh and then jard uh returning guest uh executive Head Hunter co- CEO of mission one uh you've been executive Head Hunter if I remember correctly for the past 14 years exact f using yeah

focusing a lot on the gaming industry and as of late on the broader app ecosystem exactly yeah uh thanks Mishka for having you back awesome and let's start with the uh with the most obvious question like how the two of you know each other uh great question so um Gerard and I jard you can keep me honest on this one but I think we met several years ago in your prior uh in in your role at a prior company uh before you started mission one uh May I'm going to guess maybe five six years ago something like that and then and then we became reacquainted uh in the last couple of years uh uh once I was here at Savvy and we needed uh really top uh drawer specialized uh games uh experience of the type that mission one provides and and that's how we connected reconnected with J exactly I think I tried to head hunt you unsuccessfully into a couple of roles I could tempt you whatever it was

I can't remember it was some president Co Ro and uh we could get into that one but uh uh yeah it's about six years ago but shows what a small world it is right I think that was you're in in North America then and that was for a role in Europe so it shows how sort of international how all connected it over that period yeah well talking about head hunting like Brian uh you're originally Canadian uh you've based on the companies you work with you lived in LA and how does one go from especially la the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia living in Riyad like what's that process apart from getting a call from Gerard well Gerard uh unfortunately Gerard wasn't responsible for this uh uh uh this position uh it was a different firm but um I was um I left Activision in 2012 and started lot interactive ran that for nine years and towards the end of it uh preo um I was really missing the traditional games business um and uh

because a lot of interactive real money business supporting government and state lotteries basically with mobile gains and um I really wanted to get back into this side of our industry and uh so I began looking around pre-co and dur and during the first part of covid and then um you know and then then an executive Search firm called me and said actually a couple of them called me about um jobs here in Saudi Arabia but this was the second call uh about this particular position and uh uh at first I thought it was uh a project that would sort of look like 10 cent as kind of more or less a passive investor in the games business but once I understood the the remit a little bit more clearly I thought oh this is a really unique opportunity um to uh try and build a great company to uh try and contribute to the growth of um both games development publishing and Esports and uh and then the real sort of um thing that sealed it and and convinced me to come here was once I visited Riad and

I'd never been to Saudi Arabia or even the region outside of Egypt uh and saw what was happening with vision 2030 and the pace of change in the country um as a result of um you know all the initiatives undertaken since about 2017 2018 I thought ah okay so those two things building a great company and hopefully doing some good for our industry are pretty unique but add on top of that the the chance to help some people transform their country and what seemed to me to be pretty positive ways I thought okay this is too good an opportunity to turn out turn down so that's why I'm here and what were the sort of a like perceptions you had before visiting uh the region especially Riad uh compared to like what you know what they actually are especially given that you've been in the country for the last three years and and the pace is you know we can see it based on and everything that that Saudi Arabia is doing it's incredibly fast so like what were the perception and what's the uh what what has been sort of a re of of the actual truth well I think like

most people um in the west or in America let's say who have not been to the region I had the usual preconceptions about the region and about Saudi Arabia really because I didn't have any personal experience so I you know I was aware of vision 2030 I was aware of the uh uh the move to diversify the economy away from uh oil and gas which seems like a pretty good idea uh all by itself uh thinking of the planet and um and also aware that there was you know a move towards uh modernization and uh transforming the society uh but it's hard to know what that really means until you come here in fact I think it's impossible to really understand what that means until you actually see it in action and that's why I really wanted to come here during the uh discussion phase before uh received an offer and uh and after about three days on the ground here that first time I thought ah I get it now Vision 2030 is actually a really serious thing everybody in the country has signed up to this uh initiative it feels like everybody is you know moving

in the same direction and is aligned towards this future this is a very young country super young country 70% of the population under 35 young people are just on fire about these opportunities that are being presented by Vision 2030 um they're like young people everywhere basically they want more opportunities they want more freedom etc etc uh and uh I thought okay this is uh this is really eye openening and the pace of change seems to be um astonishing from a Westerner perspective my only sort of analog for it was it's kind of like China 40 years ago where they just kind of flipped the country 180 degrees and said okay we're going this way now then they stepped on the accelerator so I thought okay well this is uh and and that's true I mean uh not everything here moves at the you know speed of light but generally speaking the transformation has been astonishing uh and that's I think the real eye openening thing and as she brought part of my experience of coming over it's it's really interesting that there's a lot of Pride from the N from from the local Saudis in in just the direction of

their their country is going and I I remember getting a plane across to Saudi earlier this year and for two hours I sat next to this guy and just you know I think from the West I think we're all a bit sort of bit awkward about being proud nationalist proud of our nation sometimes it's sort of sort of conflicted whether we want to be are we proud of being British or not or like you know where these guys are so proud of the direction of showing hey you know we're not what you think you are actually like you know there's all this stuff going on whether it's infrastructure projects or the games projects um and and again you said from the young people to meet out here they just just always want to educate you with as a as a a public duty or something like that they just want to tell you about it out of out of natural excit do do you see a lot in that in that interaction as well just the local local population oh oh totally totally I think you know and I think it's I mean everybody's proud of their country you know you go to Italy Germany Japan wherever everybody's proud of their country uh and and rightly so because every place has unique things to offer uh and um uh and Saudis are regly proud

of um you know not only their Heritage but you know where the country is headed now and the young people especially and let's keep in mind this is the demographic uh that his Royal Highness uh uh the Crown Prince belongs to uh you know he's only 38 and um and uh and women in particular are just completely on fire about the opportunities that are now available to them in the workplace and and more generally in society it's it's almost like it's almost like you know they've been waiting 1400 years for this you know change and now it's here and uh uh and from an employment and workplace perspective um they are they are among the best employees I've ever worked with uh hardworking and super dedicated and uh and and and just uh completely excited about the opportunities that are now available to them and and it shows in the statistics you know the uh the national participation amongst females in the workforce has doubled or up to last year five years years uh previous to last

year it had doubled from 16% to almost 35% exceeding the 2030 goals and out of interest when I saw that statistic I thought okay they've gone from 16% to 35% female participation in five years I wonder how long it took America to do that uh so I looked it up and now this was a long time ago uh but it took 42 years uh for that to go from that number to the other number in in America and that was you know from 1920 196 too but still half a decade versus half a century uh is a pretty remarkable difference yeah and Gerard by the way like as you are you know working with different regions and especially with this region do you feel that there is same type of a uh misconceptions or or thoughts about about opportunities in in Riad as as Brian experienced or like do you have to kind of talk people through this or is there a better understanding this this time around yeah I think to to Brian's Point actually you can you can almost feel the change in two three

years uh of the of the change of perception i' say when we first talking to people about zudi and Riyad um that was a couple of years three years ago is the first time I ever worked on on a Saudi based role and um you there's a lot of just questions of why Riad what's going on there very low knowledge um you know some just real misconceptions about even like what what's Riad like as a city right and what would it be like to be there whereas whereas now you I think everyone has felt the energy and I think it's also you know worth you know putting in the context of of postco in the games world right I think there's been a a lot of companies have lacked confidence to a degree or been acquired you know there's been this sort of there was over hiring a bit of overgrowth and then I've seen a sort of lacking of confidence in in some of those markets and now people are saying well hang on a second where's the energy coming from where's the confidence coming from yeah I think I think Riyad and savvy are one of those and you know again I'm sure we'll get on to the the acquisition of scopely was well timed should we put it like that right in terms of you know suddenly scopely and Monopoly go doing extremely well and that was linked into

the Savvy story and I think that's also helped drive a lot of curiosity as people are saying against interesting there but they've also made some really interesting Acquisitions so so I definitely say sort of the brand of perception has shifted you really dramatically in in a couple of years and you know to Bron points about female leaders and and and Executives in in and I think there's a lot of excitement there we've just placed a very senior female leader he's relocating over to Riad and and I see this across the board that a lot of senior uh female leaders in games are always sort of looking for how can we also further that right like how can we make it more normal we seeing more senior female uh leaders out there and they want to be a part of that story so it's interesting to see sort of um non-saudi uh Executives coming across as it were to also sort of you know build on that and you be a part of that movement which I think is actually quite Global um yeah I think this catches some people off guard now Micha because uh you know if you're really not familiar with the region or the country and you start talking about uh female participation in the workforce or women's rights or whatever people are

still sort of anchored in 10 years ago saying uh or six years ago saying well didn't women just get the right to drive and don't they still need a male Guardian all this and that is all completely I mean that is that is uh you know that might as well be 30-year-old news uh uh you know compared to what's happened in the short span of time since uh since all these changes occurred and it's not just that you know in hiring and uh at the uh executive level and and participation in the workforce you know in Esports as an example worldwide uh professional Esports players who are women is roughly around 5% globally in Saudi Arabia that number is 20% and the next nearest country worldwide is 12% so um you know this just another sort of marker on the the degree to which modernization is you know having an effect step into the future of game monetization with exola exola empowers

developers and Publishers to market sell connect and optimize their games globally from payment solution to a full suit of tools designed to grow your game's Revenue while fostering a lawyer player base exola is your game's gateway to worldwide success with exola the world is your playground visit exa.com today and find all the solutions that will help you to power your games into success everywhere that's super interesting so let's shift gear and talk about Savvy uh I think most of our audience probably just connects Savvy to scopely and that's uh that's about it just like Gerard you said what is Savvy games group like is it a private profit seeking Equity or a like private Equity agregator or is it an uh an engine that is diversifying the Kingdom's economy because as you said in the beginning it's very oil and gas driven are these kind of the venues are that are built to

diversify that economy yeah great question michig so we are a fully commercial operating uh company not just an investor um uh we were established as part of vision 2030 Vision 2030 just uh so everyone remembers is the is sort of the road map and blueprint for diversifying the economy away from oil and gas into 13 industrial sectors uh one of which includes entertainment and of course games is by far the biggest part of entertainment now uh and so you know hence the um uh the significant investment in the games and Esports sector uh and we are the national champion for games and Esports which is actually you know like a defined thing here um meant to be the tip of the spear for every uh games and orts uh initiative that is aimed at both so the Mandate of the company is to is to um build the world's um number one Global

games and Esports company which is a very audacious objective when you consider you know 10 cent and all the other great companies uh who are um or the leaders in our industry um and and our the second part of our objective is to help build Saudi Arabia into the next Global games and Esports Hub so there are 16 or 17 you know Global hubs that you could identify around the world in our industry and and we're meant to help build not build ourselves but help build with other stakeholders and partners um Riad gadia and other uh locations in Saudi Arabia to to be the next glowball games in Esports Hub and I think we're off to a very good start speaking of as the as a participant in the Kingdom not just as CEO of Savvy uh on the E Sports side uh and um you know that initiative in building the global games Hub or heal and build it is not really a commercially driven activity with a lot of investment that's time and effort and working with other government stakeholders and Commercial Partners

from abroad to to do two or three important things um it's a bit unusual for commercial entity like us to have this sort of mandate uh to you wouldn't normally as a commercial entity be going in convincing other companies in your industry including direct competitors to come into your home region and establish a studio or something else there but we can't build the ecosystem by ourselves no matter how much Capital we deploy so we need great companies from abroad to come here bring leadership uh create jobs open a studio game Services Company whatever it may be uh so that uh and hire local Saudi so that we can help build this ecosystem uh together we actually have at the company kpis long-term kpis against uh job creation in the kingdom and contribution to GDP which are definitely not your usual startup metrics got it so basically if you look at the the the total value of games industry let's put it at 200 billion you're probably somebody looks at it at the news report says 200

million all right so we want 5% of that here and that's going to be the the measurement and then probably looking at the the total Workforce in the game industry you would say okay we want 15,000 people working in the games industry by xwi year are these the type of a goals that that your organization has sort of uh sort of there is a national Strate yes as a company we have uh certain goals along those lines but um I think more importantly to emphasize uh uh is the fact that there is a national games and eorts strategy this is the only country on the planet that has a national strategy for our sector announced by the head of government no less uh that has 86 objectives uh under it there's an authority being establish sort of a board uh you know of senior people uh to help ensure that those 86 objectives are achieved uh within the time frame and some of those objectives are you know the establishment of um and this is not Savvy this is the you know the whole ecosystem working together to

do this 250 games and Esports companies in the Kingdom uh 39,000 jobs uh uh created and and and there and uh and a certain number of um uh top professional Esports players per capita and and this sort of thing so these are the you know and these sound like you know crazy goals uh sometimes but you know I'm Canadian so I sort of compare this to what I know from uh from North America and um you know Canada which has about a similar population to Saudi Arabia there are about 35,000 jobs in our industry um there are just in the province of Quebec I think 280 companies there might be 420 or something like that across Canada so these numbers are achievable um now whether they're achievable within the time frame that's been uh you know outlined is a different story but um these things these things are aggressive but they but they can be done and Brian just on that because I think I think a lot of people so we talk

to always curious about the ownership structure of a new company they're joining right if you're going to private Equity you've got very different style of management you've got a set objective of an exit in five to six years if you're going to a listed company obviously you've got the quarterly to board uh Cadence there it's sort of interesting explain to people how s of Savvy is set up as you said with with both a sort of almost quasa economy goals right which very unusual compared to most listed companies which are just just profit how does that how does that flow through R do you think to to listen this of actually what it what difference does it make as a as an executive at Savvy having that sort of stakeholder and that sort of that sort of objective which is which is of Economy based or as much yeah a that's a great question Gerard and I think this is what makes Savvy unique uh in some ways I mean we are a normal commercial entity in most respects a couple of differentiators though uh we have one shareholder instead of many uh we're 100% owned by U the public investment fund The Sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia uh um we have a regular you know board of

directors we have an executive committee we have all the other Hallmarks of a regular company uh and the other distinguishing factor is that thanks to our stakeholder and their very long-term view of you know developing um sectors in the Kingdom uh we have a very T long-term view in terms of investment and so we're not constrained by the you the the vagaries of quarterly earnings and other pressures that listed companies have uh we don't have the same sort of to five year time Horizon that um venture capitalist or private Equity might have we sort of think of 7 to 10 years or 10 years plus and that was an important um distinction when we were considering the Acquisitions of ESL and face it when basically when we started the company within 60 days of the company being Incorporated we'd uh we'd made successful offers for those two companies and that and you'd say well if you have a significant amount of capital domestic games and orts why would the very first thing you do do be in Esports

which is the segment of our industry overall that is most challenged for profits um and and not even overall that big in terms of Revenue not compared to the 200 billion dollar number overall and the answer is well this was you know uh still sort of coming out of Co and it was obvious that Esports was still a very fragmented space that there would be consolidation in the future we thought demand had sort of accelerated partly because of Co and I think we saw this a lot across a a lot of different things in entertainment and um and we thought well everybody who's in this space currently is kind of capital constraint or they have a short time Horizon three to five year time Horizon and therefore you make strategic decisions that fit your time Horizon and if we look at um Esports from a much longer time Horizon 7 to 10 years knowing that there could be consolidation uh there could be long-term Investments that could be made Partnerships formed and so forth that could improve the economics in e sports for all participants and that we could

make longer term decisions uh along a much uh elongated investment time Horizon that could lead us to given that engagement in Esports for the last several years has been off the charts me engagement is amazing monetization is not yet amazing uh but we thought well if we invest for the long term we can get to a different place than all the other participants could because they on a different time Horizon so that's I think been a distinguishing sort of unique selling point for companies considering partnering uh with Savvy both in orts and then subsequently with say scopely as an example so like EFG um Scully led by you know uh very competent young executive team who are really looking towards a uh uh partnering with a long-term strategic Capital provider who could give them a long Runway to achieve you know an outsized uh business outcome and and build a legacy business you know

these um these guys that I'm speaking of are interested in staying for you know many many many years and building an outsized uh business that might not be available if you had a Capital Partner that you were not sure was going to be there for the long term and then there's of course this being a a monarchy uh there's of course the the interest from the Crown Prince himself probably towards the game industry step into the future of game monetization with exola exola empowers developers and Publishers to market sell connect and optimize their games globally from payment solution to a full suit of tools designed to grow your games Revenue while fostering a lawyer player base exola is your game's gateway to worldwide success with exola the world is your playground visit exa.com today and find all the solutions that will help you to power your games into success everywhere

uh that allows that sort of a long-term view so you're not beholden to uh political decisionmaking based on the the latest election of what's the next hot thing or what do we want to invest but this is more of a almost like a a personal investment uh if if you could see it that way well I don't know if I'd go that far um no but you know the the his Royal Highness the Crown Prince has a foundation uh misk Foundation which also makes Investments um uh that are personally uh important to him uh but I think you know I think it's really driven by Vision 2030 and the diversification of the economy I think it certainly helps um that our chairman uh has such a keen interest in the sector and knowledge of the sector not just about the products and deep knowledge of the products and he plays these uh games all the time he's very um Avid Esports Enthusiast also but also understands the business uh and

the values and culture of our industry and that was super important to me in coming here because it would have been very and our vice chair uh Prince fasel uh who heads most of the East Sports organizations worldwide I'm just going to say that as a kind of a blanket statement I know not completely true but um he is sort of the um the leader of large number of Esports organizations um also uh Avid gamer and Esports Enthusiast and what been very difficult for somebody like me to come to the kingdom and report to a board maybe none of whom would be familiar with entertainment let alone games that would be a very difficult job but because the chair and the vice chair are so familiar with our industry and what's important to our industry and what's required to succeed uh it was very comforting to to to be able to rely on that support and that support has been unwavering and and just 100% And ju just following up on the on the scene again of thinking about sort of people's perceptions of of of the mid East more gen and to you michig as well

because I know you've done a lot of uh work in in the Middle East a lot of the the questions I sort of get when we talk about it is is there's an assumption there's this huge amount of capital and things are quite loose in terms of spending if I could say it that way right there's a sort of assumption that just pay like 5x the market or or what but it's not in my experience it's actually not true like there's actually a lot of it's generous there's a lot actually more sort of regul or like uh regulation but there a lot of thought that goes into these things s of benchmarking you know a lot more actually sort of I don't know if it comes from oil than gas sort of thinking through this very carefully and being a lot more structured and regulated and how your your op is is that fair to say and and again I'm just curious from both you whether you get a lot of assumptions that somehow that sort of everything is is over the top and just money is sort of flowing in and in everything you do as it were and there's gold I gold TAPS in the in the bathroom or something like that um and do you do you do you doing counter those views and as well so how do you find that sort of approach towards spending from from the committees or from from middle Easter and Stak homes

do you want me to answer that Mishka first well you're the expert uh so you go ahead and then I'll I'll piggy back on on the little that I know okay well I uh okay I from U from uh my perspective here in Saudi Arabia um and you can see in the background my office there's no gold Taps uh it's a fair they're all out of sight they're all just to the left of your camera there's not there's not not a speck of gold in this office uh uh and um uh no the rigor and discipline that's applied to everything we do whether it's our annual budget and our operating expenses projected for the next year or the various Investments we we make is is as rigorous or more rigorous than anything I've done uh before and I led about 11 Studio Acquisitions at Activision uh and I would say uh we go through a lot of Hoops here to make sure that uh every every conceivable question on valuation

and risk and every component of uh our transactions is is examined not only by us and the advisers that we employ but by the pif Mina team who is responsible for our business inside our shareholder uh overall and of course who also have to report to a board uh so there is uh there is no sort of uh freewheeling and uh and uh you know cash flying around from my experience the exact opposite actually um so with my limited experience there are cases where cash has been flowing around but that's never sustainable and and those people don't don't you know stay in that position what I like about this as as uh as Ronnie mentioned that very sort of a calculated approach that is 100% there but then there's the other side which is not being afraid to pull a trigger when there's a great deal that is on the table that might not be that might be

you know a little bit more riskier or doesn't exactly show the the type of a calculation but it fits the overall strategy and the goal so on the highest level you could say hey let's acquire Cristiano Ronaldo to play in a football team because we want that to spearhead the visibility like if you put in a number it doesn't make sense but then again if you put in the visibility of those type of Acquisitions to those teams like suddenly people know about Saudi Arabia and football teams Etc so it kind of pays more value you through that so I've seen that type of a quite I would say exciting Investments happening when it really makes sense and fits the overall Vision uh that the strategy is trying to execute but but on on a normal level like no it's uh it's it's as diligent as any and and also because of the government tie there that the process is quite strict to uh to to you know to getting paid so so you are you're you're working in that

governmental setup yeah I think that's really important to note that um that government piece I mean because we are the public invest the pif is essenti I mean that the capital and assets that they manage which is nearly a trillion dollars now I think uh is I mean that's public money so we are very conscious at Savvy that when we're putting forward you know budgets and uh proposals for transactions and so forth uh not only does this need to provide a good return on Capital uh uh and uh rate of return but um we need to also de because it is public money but we also need to demonstrate why how is this good for Saudi Arabia and how is this good for the long-term uh vision and achieving the Mandate uh of Savvy and I think the distinction you make Mishka between the rigor and discipline uh of say individual transactions or spending decisions and the um and the willingness to spend big on big things goes to the planning cycle and the long-term view of

and the long-term time Horizon uh and and this is one of the advantages I think of the system of government here which is of course an absolute monarchy but and completely different to China of course which is a centralized uh centralized government of uh of of that type but the the one thing they have in common is that they don't have to worry about the next election necessarily and they can for the long term in China like long-term planning is like 200 years so that's super longterm and uh and here you know equally that time Horizon gives a different perspective I think to spending big on things that are going to you know take a long time to achieve but are going to have a meaningful payback over the next 20 30 40 years for the kingdom yeah yeah I find that really exciting um I had a question about the uh the building of the ecosystem which is of course like one of the uh the goals for Savvy um and and by the way like in terms of Savvy like having this

governmental connection we have plenty of companies in Europe in Finland alone that are uh majority owned by the government so usually those are strategic companies whether it's talking about Airlines or certain type of energy companies like we we also have have those type of things and they do have a role that is wider than just returning to their investors so so savy being what that type of a company um you talked about like building that ecosystem and and it's an it's a very interesting challenge because on the other hand as you said you have essentially infinite resources but at the same time it is quite difficult because you have this perception and there's kind of nothing there when you started and like how do you build an ecosystem that is as as ecosystem is like working on itself is a self-driving engine and not just something that you have to constantly invest Capital into to kind of force it to work like how do you make it work um on itself like where do you start yeah that's a

great question so um well I wish it uh you know I wish the available Capital was infinite that would be amazing but uh unfortunately it is not um and um you know and and we're being held to um you know we're being held to uh account for you know every R we spend uh rightfully so and I think other part other participants in the ecosystem the same thing so to answer your question though about the um how do you build an e system how we see Savvy adding the most value to helping coordinate and collaborate with other um entities here to help bu those ecosystem is really around three things one is uh working with the government entities mostly Ministries uh to ensure that the right um incentives Financial incentives and programs are on offer to attract foreign investment so this is not a low labor cost jurisdiction this is not Eastern Europe this uh or or some other place this is you know our cost here is is as

high as it would be in America uh in terms of um development Talent let's say so in order to if you look at the development of all the most of the global hubs in our industry um a lot of them were built off the back of companies going there or local companies being established in relatively favorable jurisdictions from a cost perspective we don't have that Advantage so we need to create that Advantage like other countries have Canada being among them in terms of creating incentives to attract foreign investment and entice companies to come here to serve the region or the world from Saudi Arabia now of course you know Mina is 22 countries across the Middle East and North Africa population of 500 million people they all speak one language fifth most common language in the world 288 million gamers in this region which is more Gamers than in Western Europe or in America and it's a really underserved market so companies should be serving this Market but if we want them to serve

this Market from Saudi Arabia uh we need to provide the right incentives to do so number one number two local entrepre entrepreneurship here because of vision 2030 and the modernization of the country is on fire and we need to provide the right sort of incubation and acceleration programs uh through Partners in the Kingdom to enable local Saudis to have the financial and Operational Support to start something and be successful at it and then thirdly um training and development is needed in order to give young Saudis the skills to fill the jobs that hopefully you know um will be created locally and will be created by companies coming in here and establishing here this is a demographically favorable jurisdiction a lot of young people 67% identifies Gamers they know a lot about games they're enthusiastic about games they love our sector uh but they don't have work experience and so to give them the right skills uh to fill those jobs CLS we need the right sort of training and development programs to be uh developed

to do so super interesting got it so uh attracting foreign investment through different types of governmental incentives fostering in term entrepreneurship through incubation and training and development and as you as you look at the gaming system as a whole like we have so many things like yes you mentioned Esports a few different times we' got double a AAA indie game companies we got Mobile gaming we got cloud gaming we got all the tools Tech and AIS the platforms the engines how do you look at this sort of a broader ecosystem of all these very different type of players and is there certain um categories let's say like a AAA developers that you're not really looking into developing out of maybe in in like a short-term Horizon out of Saudi Arabia and you're focusing on others while dismissing others like how do you pick and choose essentially to build an ecosystem because all these ecosystem around the world even Montreal doesn't have all these elements exactly

and I guess the short answer is at Savvy we're not picking and choosing we're just trying to help coordinate and collab uh and establish more collaboration between all the players in the local ecosystem government uh educational institutions commercial partners and so forth uh as well as International ones to to make sure that we have those three elements that I mention on offer and that are well marketed and globally competitive with Abu Dhabi or stanbul or Canada or wherever uh so that um companies are more enticed to uh to consider this as the most viable location um but it's not really up to Savvy to say Hey you know we should let's target these AAA companies and and not trip you know or let's focus on this sort of um uh part of our industry and attracting these companies we could but I don't really view that as our mandate I view at the moment I think the the the thing we need to overcome in the kingdom is that there are a lot of local uh entities government institutions Giga

projects like gadia Neil um National Development Fund uh the Saudi Esports Federation the World Cup uh Foundation who all are interested in games and orts and seeing this developed in the kingdom and they all have interesting uh programs incentives um and offerings uh but there's not as much coordination as there could be amongst all these things uh we don't I'm not saying some of these things should go away I'm just saying everybody's playing the my analogy is everybody's playing for their club team not many of us are playing on the national team and we need to play especially since this is the only country that has a national strategy we should all play on the national team uh which will uh help um uh everyone achieve the objectives under the national strategy uh sooner got it and this podcast is brought to you by apps flyer in today's digital world understanding your app's Journey from Discovery to download is

more than just insightful it's essential enter apps flyer the leader in Mobile attribution and marketing analytics that allows you to measure the full potential of your marketing efforts making every ad dollar work smarter with apps flyer that's your new reality dive deep into Data driven insights that reveal exactly where your users come from and how they interact with your app app sler where your app's potential meets performance jar like how do you how does this so you work with uh I mean you work with several ecosystems like how does the development of this ecosystem compared to the other ones that you work with like let's say California and have work in Canada and the European Union and several different cities yeah I think I think it's a really sort of broad topic actually a lot of interest because you've got these sort of different hubs right you've got as you said Montreal right I think that's the easy one to sort of think about and say like really that was a a very deliberate push right by Ubisoft with local government to go in and build an infrastructure and I think I can't remember how how many

people they've got I think it's like 5,000 people maybe in Ubisoft Montreal alone and then there's loads of you waves of of other Studios that have that have sprung up around that core and that's on some more the on the PC console side and then you've got other analogies of say as Barcelona which you had social point in there early King in there early and then scop Cliff come in a bit later and they all seal each other's people's uh each other's people and they all sort of fall out over it but you that's a really interesting sort of E it in itself the mobile and obviously Helsinki where you're based M I'm not going to tell you about that but you know I think again you've seen you know these sort of hubs for um but that's been a very organic right and again to Istanbul is this this very sort of organically grown up uh system around around mobile so it's it's I think there's there's interesting parallels of you know a a obviously it's easier to go develop a mobile game from scraps and the is to go build a a AAA right in terms of like the level of investment and the the level you of capital and structure you have have behind those things and Technical capabilities so

it's it's sort of I I think sort of um R has has similarities to all those markets but is it its own sort of use case or its own sort of case study uh in itself but I thought BR picking up on what you're saying there about so of not it sounds like you're not trying to pick a winner right you're not trying to say like this is like the future is uh games of the service triaa or you know whatever it is and we're just going to double down on this it sounds like you're taking a little bit more of a a broader approach and again I'm curious to both you because I think again the industry is looking at savy to sort of you know looking at Players like where it's AB Microsoft whe they're looking at sort of supercell whoever it is right to say like where where are people placing their bets of where they think they're going forward because it feels to me from a lot of what I see in the market is we had the big rise of mobile now it's more of a mature business right in terms of like it's not going to go 20 30% year a year uh uh going forward we had the big switch to games as a service which obviously was huge you know from from box products and to to to to live products I would say there's a lack of confidence or maybe comes the wrong word

but a lack of some certainty around where where next for the for the games industry right and and um one area is a lot we see a lot more Crossover with broader consumer you know games how does that help you learn at school right education how does games help you uh be fitter and healthier you know how does it help you date online and meet people so we see all these sort of Trends going on I'm curious both Brian and michiga like where where do you feel and we have talk about AI as well I'm curious if that that's a big word part of the strategy but where where where's the sort of the instincts of okay ecosystem is probably G to look different in five years time to what games makes up on where where are your instincts on where that that might be heading M I'll let you go first this time well well it depends on who you ask because there's different goals for different type of organization these type of questions like Gerard that's you're absolutely correct if I'm a venture capitalist I'm investing into the future and finding the new growth that's incredibly important to bet on the new platform the new rise the new

wave then again if I'm uh uh working at a at a governmental institution that is uh building an ecosystem around a $200 billion business I'm much more conservative and I'm looking at taking a stake of this existing Pi through direct Investments and and acquisition so I'm able to uh to participate already into this sizable uh and ecosystem that is growing that you know two three percentages a year rather than betting everything on AI and seeing nothing come out out of that or cloud gaming or VR and AR or weip 3 like those are much more riskier for a conservative investor who has a little bit of a different type of a time span time Horizon as well as different type of a targets you're not looking at 15x return you're looking at uh a persistent uh GDP percentage coming from this uh sector so be my answer yeah yeah yeah I think that's right um my

take on it is um the one of the easier things to consider if you're uh publisher developer is geographical expansion how can you take your games into a market you might not be uh focusing on and this was the subject of conversation Prince fasel and I had with many companies in Japan Korea and China earlier this year on a couple of different trips and um you know a lot of companies still in our industry still uh this region here the Middle East North Africa is still part of what they call Amia Europe Middle East and Africa and this is now of such a size 288 million Gamers this deserves to be Mina not a Mia you know run by some guy in Berlin or whatever Amsterdam whatever no put somebody in the Middle East uh Riyad or Abu Dhabi or Dubai or whatever and focus on this medor region this is 288 million Gamers across 22 countries all

speaking Arabic that are uh that is really underserve these are highly monetizable these are amongst the highest spending consumers on the planet in our industry uh and there are so if you're a publisher developer not only should you be thinking about language localization but down you can be thinking about how to make more culturally relevant content so the companies in China Japan Korea have been very good over the last several years at telling uh the stories of their ancient law and traditions through our medium in video games there are this is you know this this region of the world is thousands of years old in human history with an equal number of compelling um uh sto uh historical stories in ancient lore that have not been told I mean we all know aladen and Alibaba and the 40 thieves and so forth uh Disney products and this and that but through our medium these stories have not been told and there's a lot of culturally relevant stories and and and content that could

be developed this is not like next year or anything but if you think about really developing uh and expanding your um your investment and increasing your returns this is a region where you should consider doing that in those ways yeah makes makes total sense um so so we're talking about you know growing whether it's growing in individual business or growing in an ecosystem um kind of Brian you mentioned one of the hurdles or not the hurdles but the challenges is you have several team playing towards the same goal but not necessarily coordinating as much uh what are other sort of hurdles as you are you know building up this this or not not per se building up the ecosystem but being a major part in the foundation of the ecosystem of gaming in in the Kingdom I think it's Talent Development uh if I had to put my finger on on the thing that is probably most relevant you know aside from local aside from U

lowcost jurisdictions other hubs in our industry have developed where there was a great base of talent and uh and uh and this is a fairly nent market for talent so I think focusing on tal uh skills development uh and education and so forth and building up that Talent base will be the most single most impactful thing now the challenge is that doesn't occur overnight I mean nobody's graduating from a university in Saudi next year with a degree in game design uh you know this takes many years to to put in place but that I think is the single most um important thing we could achieve and probably Talent Development even as we were talking about like Montreal 1 but we could talk about Vietnam the same thing with uh with gameloft's um major Studios there that then spawn so many new companies like the best talent development tends to come on the job because not only are you developing your skills but you're also meeting the other people who you're working with together and then you're you know meeting up after work and maybe

doing some weekend projects and that at some point like you know what maybe we should start our own company and that kind of spawns spawns that type of thing so so how do you sort of um uh create that aspect like how like is is there a plan since the acquisition of scopely and presumably other Acquisitions in the future is there a plan to have part of the development you know was happening in in Riad so that that sort of Fosters that Talent Development or is that kind of like part of the contracts or not like like how are you viewing this this aspect I I think that's an important part uh to think about in the future EFG is already here in a big way having uh Run the World Cup uh this past summer and Gamers 8 for the past two years now have a long-term agreement to run the World Cup for the next several years uh likely will run the uh the inaugural Esports Olympics next year

here in Riad so they've already started developing a good base of talent here but I think the main you know it's not really up to Savvy uh we're not going to you know Savvy eyes our way to uh like a Global Hub it requires other other participants and I think you know one of the mo one of the best things that could occur is for large game services companies to really focus on this market and say um you know this is where we could establish uh a base uh to provide uh QA customer service live Ops etc etc you know in the way that you know keywords virtuous are experts at this uh and help Publishers you know enter this market and support them in this market and that would be and as you know you know a lot of those jobs QA and otherwise are the uh the way people get into our industry right you don't take somebody out of high school and make them an executive producer tomorrow so um game Services uh would be a really important component if we can find a way to to interest you know parties in that

uh and uh and then large Publishers of course do a lot of that on their own uh anyway and and I think those are the sorts of foundational jobs we should aim to be creating in the kingdom and you know it's your your point M again we see a lot in those other hubs we talking about it's Istanbul or or Barcelona or Helsinki right that it's not just the individual learning right but you said it's the team the sort of the knowledge of working together as that small unit that actually is that Hub that it's hard to go sub business on your own but when you've got three four guys or people around you right you can start to to to to to do that and to your point out Mich as well bringing in the time with the with the hurdles I think also you know as we're talking about here there's a sort of long-term Brown building pie I think that you know fre we're seeing this is it's maybe not on the first call you necessarily got your your passport ready right and you're going to go uh to the Middle East necessarily but there's a of definitely sort of a year on-ear accretion of going out there hearing about a friend has been out there hearing about a new team that spun out from there seeing a a VC suddenly make

their first investment in that region right it's sort of become sort of I I think I think there's there's a sort of a a brand piece around the relocation around the ecosystem that's that sort of goes beyond just Savvy right as well that sort of is is being built very rapidly but still you know still still still in that educational phase um and again just like you know just like the Coca-Cola you're picking on your on your shop right like there's so much subconsciously that's that's going on in Executives mind I in our experience at least of of so when you present an opportunity that that sort of influences that ability to say yes this is really interesting versus H that's kind of cool but bit bit crazy maybe or a bit bit different from what I was thinking yeah I I mean all of these ecosystems have their own incentive structures like even when we're discussing you know you've mentioned Istanbul a couple of times turkey has their own incentive systems they you know they the capital income gain tax is pretty low for for these companies there's direct support for development there's there's direct support for Market entry there's direct support for

for sales everything is getting uh subsidized by the government to really help smaller companies become midsize and kind of run on their own so really help them to uh to take off the ground because that is the type of an ecosystem that they have is a lot of a smaller Studios that then can grow into these billion dollar companies that are still relatively small like 100 people or so but are are quite successful and so the question is kind of like what are like I understand there's there's The Branding aspect there's the uh uh there's the story that you can tell about Riad and how how uh how good of a place it would be to relocate but what are the tangible elements that let's say an individual and a company relocating there uh are are able to get or like like what kind of a support can can they um can they see so I think you're asking about specific incentives and programs yeah so um you know Misa which is the um uh the government Ministry responsible for attracting foreign investment um they

have uh a a lot of good programs and incentives on offer to game developers and games Publishers and so forth and um uh you know like a lot of places those cover you know uh labor C you know subsidies for labor cost help with uh relocation and uh everything from visas uh to to uh you know obtaining office space and some rent relief um on premises and and so forth and what I think needs to happen is um examination of those uh programs and incentives and ensuring that they are uh competitively globally uh with other jurisdictions and that they do infect uh uh they do achieve the desired result of making the commercial decision easier for executives and managers elsewhere where to say oh I've run the numbers and with these incentives rad is the best place

to be Visa Istanbul Helsinki or this place or that place uh and um and and then ensuring that they are those programs are are dovetailed with other uh programs that are on offer in the Kingdom neom has incentives Gia is talking about incentives the national Development Fund has uh programs and so forth and making sure these things work together in the best collaborative way uh to to achieve the desired uh result and then making sure that they're uh well marketed uh and understood and that the process for obtaining them uh is good you know there's still there there's still a lot of you know churn in the system in terms of you know how do you get the be you know you go one place for visas and you go uh you know go to another place for your business license or you have to apply you at this ministry before you go to Misa and if you get rejected by this other Ministry then you can apply to the Misa thing and then this and that you know and you know whereas other places are doing a super good job Abu Davi you know it's amazing

you know I don't know I don't know if this is true but I've been told you basically go to one building you know and you go this floor you get a business license this floor you get Vis for employees this floor you get a driver's license for everybody by the time you've left the building two hours later you have a business a new wife and everything's amazing and then here here you can drive around for two weeks and figure out how to get a appointment at the driver's license bureau so so um we need to do a better job job making sure um you know and this is these are the sorts of red tape issues that slow companies down and make them you know say you know what it's too much trouble just go to a different place yeah and I had this experience at Activision you know there are a lot of states in in the US that have offered incentives in our industry for a long time now and these are usually tax credits but the big difference between most of those programs and the programs say in Ontario and Quebec is Ontario and Quebec offer refundable tax credits M most of other jurisdictions that offer tax credits especially in the US offer

non-refundable tax credits meaning you can use the tax credit towards your tax liability in that state so Arizona phones you and says hey you guys should really consider moving to Phoenix you know the weather's amazing and everything's fantastic and then you ask about the incentive and you realize you can use a portion of the incentive but your tax liability in Arizona is not going to be that high and then you're going to have this unused credit that you can sell on the secondary market like the guys do for 85 cents on the dollar but by the time you explain this to your finance department the finance guys say that's too much trouble we don't want anything to do with this secondary Market business just go to a jurisdiction that has a refundable tax credit and so you you you just make the easier decision so we need to make it easy for people here to say it's a no-brain yes yeah correct and and uh income tax there's no income tax in Saudi Arabia as well which is is is an easy one to understand for a lot of Executives Right Moving in obviously if you're American that's that doesn't necessarily apply to you but I think again if you look at Spain which which has a law called um

Beckham's law for example named after David Beckham they have very favorable tax rate to to to for five years I think it is uh for for sort of exact I think they're now closing it down but but again you sort of have to explain it to people we have to understand it a little bit um I'd also say you know no income taxes easily understood but for most us paying income as which helps which helps the individual and it helps the company to the extent that they recognize Revenue in the country but to the extent that they repatriate dollars to a different tax jurisdiction that's not you know you need to come up with a different incentive yeah yeah exactly and then the easiness of bureaucracy is super important as you mentioned in in uh in in UAE like there's stories where you get your golden Visa by the time you take your cab from the airport to your hotel and it's waiting you out there so so like that that really tells you that you are welcome exactly exactly and and it starts you off with the you know with the right

foot for like okay yes this is this is good I like this bureaucracy is easy let's let's move from here um yeah so so got it so so it's a it's a little bit um still um uncoordinated in terms of uh what the incentives are like individual incentives of course no taxes that's that's very clear but in the end you're of course looking for companies to relocate so that you can start building that ecosystem but by by these companies you know hiring training and and and you know building their own operations that then over the years can spawn uh a self-sustaining ecosystem so yeah that's that's interesting to follow yeah and I think you know you you you look at the Mina Market which is Middle East North Africa but in a few years we'll be looking at subsaharan Africa as a market and and you could serve you could easily serve uh the Indian subcontinent from this Market uh so I mean the opportunity is not just restrained to arabic speaking you know North Africa Middle

East uh countries and yes yes 100% and kind of like um as as we're heading towards the uh the time limit I know you're very busy both of you um I wanted to ask a couple of questions one is around um working in the Gulf States and and in the Kingdom like how is it different compared to American working culture for example like uh let's say is it as aggressive as American where decisions are quickly made you act upon them or or is it uh is it more personal based like working with with Asian uh companies where your relationship with the founder with the CEO is the most important thing that personal relationship that trust that you have is is is the key or like is it somewhere in between or how is it like working in in that type of a culture yeah you want me to go first Gerard please please BR okay um it's very interesting I think in terms of fitting in culturally it's very easy to fit in you know uh people uh almost all

people speak English here uh in business and uh uh a lot of people are Western educated they understand a lot about the West they all have Netflix I mean it's very it's not like this completely foreign place that people might think it is if they're not familiar with the region it's not like that at all I think it's much easier to integrate into frankly from that perspective than than um some countries in the far east as an example um and and um from a business culture perspective I would say it's much more relational I mean America's probably the most hardcore transactional you know country and I've lived you know I lived there 20 years um and it's you know basically hi nice to meet you you know here's the contract you know press hard three copies and uh you know and here it's um here it's much more relational kind of like I would say a lot of places in Asia and in the Far East you know so it's a very face-to-face culture it's very relationally uh important to get to know people um I would say also uh this is a very

hierarchical society and that translates over into the business uh culture as well um very hierarchical I would say the closest analog um I can think of is Japan you know which is also very hierarchical so we go through a lot of approvals and reviews and so forth and that does take time so I think uh people coming here should have an expectation that things don't happen as quickly as they might in America let's say but America is pretty you know pretty extreme in some ways uh and um so I think um you know coming from North America does require some you know adjustment of expectations in that regard um I think Europeans might have a you know a slightly more aligned uh you know view there are a lot of countries in in Europe where it is a very relationally oriented business culture um and um so I think that's my major observation of it after uh three years or Jord what do you how do you it's I think it's interesting because I suppose it feels as much more mixed with savvy than say other International cultures

I've worked with in terms you've got Bri's Canadian you've got Americans you got a lot of local Saud where whereas you're working with an American Court pretty much most people are American obviously there might be a few Brits in there or working uof lot French you know like it's it's sort of I I'd say um it's more more of a mix of cultures there in in in my experience and actually that requires a little bit more nuance and a little bit more s of agility to switch gears depending on who you're working with and who you know who who you're who's in that room uh with the meeting and I'd probably say as well the the the the email culture this my experience is less strong in terms of like if you want to get a result from someone or get on to something you know try and as Brian say build that personal relationship try and get on a call have that conversation and then realize that you know there's might be other things going on between whereas I think I think again compared to a US client lot more emails lot more sort of very quick fire like this is happening XYZ versus I think you know there has to be a bit more of a look we said this would happen might now take a

week or two weeks for that to go through the committee or something has to the approve or whatever and and you've got to show that patience because I think that's you know you can't you can't move it along by just sort of chiving uh as as as it were and actually it's probably probably gonna wind people up I think I've probably made that that mistake myself at times there so um so I think it's it's a bit more nuanced um uh but so not not rocket science is probably my my overview yeah I would say another uh another difference is um you know culturally generally speaking uh and this probably applies to the entire region but at least from my experience in Saudi Arabia uh people are very polite uh they're very considerate they're quite softspoken and very non-confrontational if you look at the and there's some studies that have been done on this Saudi Arabia is one of the least confrontational cultures in the entire world and so this you know people should expect that uh to Gerard's point this is a very nuanced culture and it's not going to be totally obvious or as uh

uh yeah as obvious it is in America like uh where you stand with people again like this is not unusual in Asia or in the Far East you know there there are similarities uh but uh this is important to take into consideration uh also yeah yeah I I again with my limited experience I I'll just say kind of like three things to to highlight for people who are interested doing business in in the Gulf States I would say the three things as you mentioned so first of all Brian like the personal relationship especially with the key stakeholders not with with anybody but once you establish that personal relationship it happens a lot not through emails but actually you will you know use your telegram or WhatsApp to do a lot of calls and and um and conversations through the phone and then only the uh the official stuff goes then through the email uh that kind of uh solidifies the the communication and moves things forward with the rest of the team um the other things that I uh that I've experienced personally is is yes patience is incredibly important if

you're used to that transactional approach where once you agree on something on the call you expect the contract to come through or whatnot that is not what's going to happen it might take months and months and months before things move to that but you have to be just patient and trust that your relationship with that person will move these things forward and when it will um you know they have the decision-making power and you'll be able to do interesting things and then finally like something that uh I don't know if either you kind of brought this forward but it's very important to be respectful for their culture and understand uh as you said their history and different type of cultural Concepts what it means to be a a guest for example like all these things are are are um are very important and shows that that you are interested in working with the the people who live here and not just coming in to extract um you know uh money basically because heard that they have it and and they do smell that really quickly so if that's

your goal you'll be you know pretty quickly exposed and that's going to be a short stint yeah 100% 100% and um and I mean that's common sense advice for anybody traveling either just on vacation or for business just about anywhere in the world you know be respectful of the culture and the people and uh and and do your best to uh to you know not be offensive um and U yeah and I mean I think this probably goes to the whole Gulf region but yeah people who are here uh to uh extract a lot of money without uh due consideration of uh the benefit that they're providing and and the service and and and being respectful of all the things you just mentioned yeah they can see that coming a mile away uh yeah you're you're GNA be out you're gonna have a very short stay here yeah yeah there's ton of those so that's why they can spot them because it's your stereotype at that point when you when you just try to do so to kind of um cap this off this episode like um both on the company level and uh and then individual level

like what's the best way to explore opportunities and in the Kingdom or working with the kingdom like let's say if you were a company like Brian like what is Savvy looking for um what is the the kingdom looking for what would you be your advice to uh to um basically CEOs um in terms of uh the kingdom well uh couple of part I'll try and make this brief uh in the interest of time but you know from uh our investment uh uh Outlook uh we're looking primarily at mobile first uh crossplatform free-to-play business live Services businesses through the lines of sculle sculley you know has a very very good corporate development team that looks at uh all you know hundreds of opportunities per year in that space and so we're relying on them in the short term to identify you know some great opportunities and and and then to um you know broaden that uh funnel a little bit

next year in terms of the Kingdom uh that's a great question um we have a unit that we're sort of revamping to help better serve the national games and Esports strategy uh but I would guess uh I think that either through the website which I think has a uh how to get a hold of us uh length um or through my uh chief of sta I hate I'm not going to give him his email address on this podcast because I think he'll probably get too many emails but uh I think the best way is probably through the website and then uh and then we can direct traffic inside the kingdom to say okay if you're looking for you know uh Venture Capital if you're looking how to establish a business or you're looking how for this answer whatever we could figure out who to direct you to and are there any events coming in in Saudi Arabia that that company should be looking forward to attending yeah I'm sure there are and I don't have that unfortunately calendar right at the at my fingertips I think Pocket Gamer has something coming up towards the end of the year um we're looking and I think

where there's a high probability will attract some major Games events next year uh but that's not announced yet um but I know Pocket Gamer has something towards the end of the year and I think it might be November December um yeah so stay tuned for that um Gerard if you're an individual and you're looking to uh to work in the Gulf States to uh to follow Brian's footsteps like like how do you how do you get there who do you contact like what do you have to be prepared for yeah I think um again I mean I think sort of getting to know Savvy is is such a great sort of Anchor Point you just to Echo that as as as as pizza but I know I big believer just getting across that you know I I think just going across and said there's lots of events there whether Savvy or lat or otherwise it feels like there's probably an event in R every week I don't know if that's quite right but there's there's something he's nodding that okay so there's there's something going on there all the time and and I said like it sort of Chang quite rapidly the city so you can go there and if you're just going to see hear about maab or something like

that there's there's a reason to go there and I think actually having that on on the ground experience would help you navigate a little bit of what you're working with and what does it really mean and give some credibility so I appreciate not everyone's going to weekend to spare but it's not that expensive to get out there it's very e to get I got a Visa arrival if you can do that um I think that would be my best advice and and just of slowly building a few contacts as steer Studios I think there's a lot of expats at steer Studios um um as well so to your listeners they probably might know somebody's already out there actually or know somebody knows someone but you could also s of reach out to and get a soft a soft sense of like hey I saw you moved out there with steer Studios what's going on how you finding it etc etc of good good good touch points as well as you know again I'm happy to take call I'm conscious as well of like the uh you know the volume that I've C previously from these things is sort of they're rather extreme so um you know as well always have to talk to some great Executives who are interested in Middle East or just General relocation and thinking about you how do we how do we relocate or what are the considerations of of building the new e care system always have to take those

calls right there you got it um so all the kind of like basic information on living working establishing business in in um in Saudi Arabia and Riyad if you're individual executive slide into the DMS of jar and if you a business owner then um then then look to get to contact with with Savvy and and for for any individuals interested in the uh in the region um look at different events white Knights Pocket Gamer um hit games all of them are doing different events once you come to a location you're open to it um you want to meet up people I'm sure you're going to get to visit a lot of different Studios and through that establish your connection the old school way meeting people in real life so that actually still works and um I've done it actually in the same region so I suggest others to do it it does work uh but on that note thank you so much Brian thank you so much Gerard for for uh for giving an hour of your time and uh I'm talking about this uh new growing booming region

of gaming great to be with you Misha thanks a lot likewise thank you did it you made it to the end of the episode is a fan of the show it would help us out if you subscribe and leave us a review on the podcast service of your choice more importantly are you a member of the deconstructor of fun slack group if you have 5 years or more of games industry experience go to deconstructor of fun.com /s slack and apply to join join the games industry's best professional Community filled with peers always willing to lend a hand or subscribe to our newsletter to get all the latest insights from the deconstructor of fund content creators thanks for listening [Music]