LEAP: 2024 Edition (With The WIRED Coverage)
Following our cooperation in the region, we contributed to LEAP's 2024 Edition (1), held 4-7 March 2024 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The event drew a record 215,000 visitors and facilitated more than $13.4 billion in technology and digital infrastructure investments, with 1,800-plus international exhibitors, over 600 startups, and 1,600-plus investors managing a combined $4.89 trillion in assets. Our contribution, focused on public systems and infrastructure, was also covered by WIRED Middle East (1).
Related
LEAP and the Saudi AI Ecosystem
Founded in 2022 by Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, LEAP has grown into one of the world's most attended technology conferences, held annually in Riyadh and co-located with DeepFest, the region's dedicated AI conference. The 2024 edition spanned 10 stages and 19 tech tracks, anchored by major investment announcements including AWS's $5.3 billion commitment to a Saudi cloud zone, Datavolt's $5 billion sustainable data center pledge, and further partnerships from Aramco Digital, IBM, Microsoft, and Adobe, alongside the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority's (SDAIA) push on AI research and national capability-building. Our session addressed how algorithmic and assistive technology, particularly systems supporting cognitive, sensory, and physical spectrums such as autism and dyslexia, can be designed with human-centricity and cross-cultural cooperation at their core, building on prior work curating the Global AI Summit in Riyadh in 2022 and engagement with Saudi Arabia's Center for AI Ethics and Research.
LEAP has continued as a fixed annual fixture since: the 2025 edition (its fourth) drew over 201,000 visitors and secured $14.9 billion in deals and announcements, while the 2026 edition, marking LEAP's fifth anniversary, was rescheduled from its original spring date to 31 August–3 September 2026 amid regional developments, continuing to serve as a convening point where technology strategy, policy direction, and capital deployment intersect at scale.
References
¹ Economy Middle East. "LEAP 2024 Conference Concludes With $13.4 Billion in Investments." March 2024.
² GEC Newswire. "LEAP 2024 Breaks Its Own Record With 215,000 Visitors, 25% Jump in YoY Attendance." March 2024.
³ WIRED Middle East. "Yonah Welker Is Bridging Technological Frontiers in the Age of AI." 2024.
⁴ U.S.-Saudi Business Council. "LEAP 2024: Saudi Arabia Jumps Into the Global Data and Technology Industry." March 2024.
⁵ Wikipedia. "LEAP Tech Event." Accessed 2026.