Last Friday, I had the opportunity to join an extraordinary group of
women entrepreneurs mostly from Saudi Arabia for a lunch at the home of
the Honorable Esther Coopersmith. All were both proud of their higher
education in Saudi Arabia and had started companies in a wide range of
businesses from construction to IT. I should not have been surprised.
Starting a business in Saudi Arabia is relatively easy. Its “ease of
starting a business” rank is 13 out of 183 economies, according the
World Bank’s Doing Business 2010
data. This is not surprising. Saudi Arabia is widely recognized as a
leader in promoting and enabling entrepreneurship and innovation.
Entrepreneurship enjoys high level support in this country. Prince Abdulaziz bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz, the advisor to the King of Saudi Arabia, chairs the Saudi Arabian National Entrepreneurship Center (NEC), an institution created to empower the young to be successful entrepreneurs by creating the needed supportive environment through specialized education, training, knowledge, mentoring, and finance.
Moreover, Saudi Arabia is home to the one of the most influential Middle Eastern educational institutions, the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). The university is an international, graduate-level research university dedicated to inspiring a new age of scientific achievement in the Kingdom, across the region and around the globe. KAUST recruited top education leaders from around the world to ensure high-impact education, and engages in academic relationships and research collaborations with various global academic institutions.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Policy Dialogue on Entrepreneurship | Entrepreneurship in Saudi Arabia
Author: Jonathan Ortmans is president of the Public Forum Institute, a non-partisan organization dedicated to fostering dialogue on important policy issues. In this capacity, he leads the Policy Dialogue on Entrepreneurship, focused on public policies to promote entrepreneurship in the U.S. and around the world. In addition, he serves as a senior fellow at the Kauffman Foundation.
