LEAP 5 opens as Saudi Arabia’s digital economy grows to $199 billion

Marking the start of its fifth edition, LEAP opened with more than $15 billion in technology investments and strategic commitments, reinforcing the event’s position as a global launchpad for innovation and reflecting the rapid growth of Saudi Arabia’s technology sector since its inaugural edition in 2022.

The event welcomed global technology leaders, investors, founders and innovators for four days of major announcements, live demonstrations and conversations across AI, advanced computing, mobility, gaming, sport and emerging technology. The program spanned 16 stages and more than 20 content tracks, alongside new zones and experiences that reflected how LEAP had evolved over its first five editions.

Opening LEAP 5, H.E. Eng. Abdullah Alswaha, Minister of Communications and Information Technology, highlighted the rapid expansion of Saudi Arabia’s technology sector. Since LEAP’s launch, the Kingdom’s digital economy has grown by 69 percent, from $118 billion to $199 billion, while women now represent 36 percent of the technology workforce.

The Main Stage featured some of the most influential voices shaping the global technology landscape, including H.E. Eng. Abdullah Alswaha, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology; Dr. Lisa Su, Chair and CEO of AMD; Chuck Robbins, Chair and CEO of Cisco; and Tareq Amin, CEO of HUMAIN. They were joined by futurist and theoretical physicist Michio Kaku; Javier Tebas, President of LaLiga; and senior leaders and voices from companies including NVIDIA, Google, Roblox, Uber, Meta, Lenovo, Nokia and Luma AI.

Among the opening-day announcements, HUMAIN unveiled HUMAIN M3, a new open-weights Arabic language model trained on more than one trillion Arabic tokens, alongside HUMAIN Voice, a conversational AI platform designed for multiple Arabic dialects, including Saudi, Maghrebi, Egyptian and Levantine Arabic.

Tareq Amin, Chief Executive Officer of HUMAIN, said: “No company delivers something at this scale on its own. What you are seeing is a country rallied around a mission, with partners across the Kingdom building alongside us. The leadership understood early that AI is a foundational technology rather than an additive one, and everything we are building serves that vision.”

HUMAIN also announced a strategic partnership with Applied Intuition to deploy physical AI technologies across Saudi Arabia, beginning with autonomous trucking. The collaboration aimed to establish the world’s largest autonomous trucking network, with thousands of autonomous vehicles expected to operate across key Saudi logistics corridors by 2030.

Additional announcements included a $5 billion joint investment between HUMAIN and AWS in the AWS HUMAIN AI Zone, supporting the development of advanced AI infrastructure and cloud capabilities in the Kingdom. Meanwhile, xAI announced one of its most significant international expansions to date, with a major Saudi-based data center deployment beginning with 50MW of capacity and scaling to 500MW, while AMD and HUMAIN confirmed the deployment of AMD’s largest inference cluster outside the United States.

Adobe also highlighted its contribution to Saudi Arabia’s creative economy, which has reached $4 billion over the past 12 months through investment in digital creativity and innovation.

With Saudi Arabia’s Year of AI providing the wider backdrop, AI ran throughout the program and experiences at LEAP 2026, with a focus on how the technology was moving from discussion into real-world applications.

At Tech Arena, Unitree robots took to the floor for live dance demonstrations, alongside AGIBOT’s A2 Ultra humanoid robot and COGNIXION technology that enabled users to communicate with and control devices using brain signals.

The Future Mobility Zone brought robotaxis, autonomous delivery drones and flying taxis to the show floor, while GameX Creative featured new game reveals, LEAP’s Roblox obstacle course and an ESL FACEIT esports racing simulator experience. SportsHub put visitors in the driving seat through an interactive F1 experience powered by Saudi Motorsport Company and the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, including a racing simulator and an interactive journey through the Jeddah Corniche Circuit. The new LEAP Studios served as a live hub for podcasts, interviews and creator-led content from across the event.

Global capital and startup growth were also firmly in focus, with 1,289 investors from 1,016 firms representing a combined $14.5 trillion in assets under management confirmed to attend. Rocket Fuel saw 100 finalists compete for a US$1 million equity-free prize pool following more than 3,000 applications, while Ecosystem Xchange created further opportunities for founders to access new markets and build partnerships.

Annabelle Mander, Executive Vice-President and Co-Creator of LEAP, said: “Five years ago, together with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology and SAFCSP, we set out to create a place in Riyadh where the global technology community could come together and turn ambition into meaningful action. What LEAP has become since then goes far beyond its scale. It is about the people who connect here, the partnerships that begin here and the opportunities that continue long after the doors close. Tomorrow, we open our fifth edition, bringing the world’s technology community together once again and reflecting the extraordinary progress of both LEAP and Saudi Arabia’s technology ecosystem.”

Mike Champion, Co-founder of LEAP and CEO of Tahaluf, said: “Since 2022, LEAP has helped establish Saudi Arabia as one of the world’s most dynamic technology markets, bringing together investors, innovators and industry leaders to create tangible outcomes. As we enter the fifth year, the scale of today’s announcements reflects both the maturity of the event and the Kingdom’s growing influence in shaping the future of the global technology sector.”