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Tariq Al-Mansouri

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  • 4 min read

PUBLISHED BY ICN PRESS

  • SDAIA Academy will run 18 specialized bootcamps in data and artificial intelligence during August.
  • Tracks include generative programming, AI agent systems engineering, computer vision, prompt engineering, and modern data engineering.
  • Registration runs through the AthkaX platform, SDAIA’s national capacity-building portal.
  • The programs align with the Year of Artificial Intelligence and the workforce goals of Saudi Vision 2030.

SDAIA Academy summer bootcamps return this August with 18 specialized training programs in data and artificial intelligence. The Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority announced the lineup on July 20 under what it calls the future summer initiative. Two groups are in scope. Specialists already working in the field and people trying to break into it.

Think of it as a compressed apprenticeship. Rather than a semester of theory, participants spend the days building.

What the 18 tracks cover

The curriculum leans technical. Programs run across generative programming, AI agent systems engineering, AI agent development, and modern data engineering for AI applications. Computer vision for developers is on the list. So are prompt engineering, responsible AI use, and applying artificial intelligence to raise productivity and tighten business processes.

Those titles map closely to what companies are hiring for right now. An AI agent that books, checks, and escalates on its own needs someone who can wire it together and keep it from going off the rails. That is a job, not a concept.

Data governance gets equal billing.  A second cluster of programs handles data management, governance, quality, and integration. It sounds less glamorous than agent engineering. It usually decides whether the agent works at all. A model reads whatever you feed it. Feed it duplicated records and stale fields, and the output looks confident and wrong. SDAIA has spent years building the rules around national data use, so training people to apply those rules is part of the same project.

How the SDAIA Academy summer bootcamps run

The format is intensive. Short, dense, hands-on. The academy focuses on practical skills, smart solution development, application design, and best practices in responsible AI deployment and data management. Participants are meant to walk out with work they built rather than notes they will lose.

That design says something about the hiring market. Shipping an AI agent or repairing a broken pipeline is demonstrable. Reading about either is not.

Registration and the AthkaX platform

Registration for the SDAIA Academy summer bootcamps runs through the AthkaX platform at athkax.sdaia.gov.sa. AthkaX is SDAIA’s national platform for capacity building in data and AI, launched during the International Conference on Data and AI Capacity Building. Program details and schedules are on the same platform.

Where the bootcamps fit in Saudi Vision 2030

August is the second wave of the season. In early July, SDAIA Academy launched eight training programs and bootcamps under a July summer initiative, mixing professional tracks with beginner courses on prompt engineering and AI at work. Eighteen bootcamps are more than double that count, in a single month.

The SDAIA training bootcamps sit within the Year of Artificial Intelligence and the workforce ambitions of Saudi Vision 2030, which calls for a globally competitive digital workforce. AthkaX connects to the Human Capability Development Program, one of the Vision 2030 programs.

AI training programs in Saudi Arabia have turned into a steady pipeline rather than scattered one-off events. Over the past year, SDAIA Academy has run a quantum computing camp and a professional program in large language models built toward NVIDIA certification. The SDAIA Academy summer bootcamps extend that cadence into the summer months, when students and job seekers have time to commit.

If a move into data or AI work is on your list, August is the window.

Saudi Arabia’s AI market, 2025–2032

saudi-ai-market-chart

 

Three houses looked at the same market and came back with numbers that barely overlap. Ken Research starts Saudi AI at $4.3 billion in 2025 and takes it to $19.36 billion by 2031. A second forecast begins higher, at $5.2 billion, but grows more slowly and lands at $14.3 billion. A third starts at just $2.14 billion and nearly matches the top line by 2032.

The base year is where they disagree most: the highest estimate is more than double the lowest. That gap is a definitional problem, not a forecasting one. What all three agree on is direction, and Saudi enterprise spending backs it up.

TAGS
  • AI, Artificial Intelligence, Data Centers, Saudi Arabia

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Parkin's regional growth plans
  • Parkin

Parkin’s regional growth plans now stretch past the UAE, after the Dubai-listed parking operator signed a memorandum of understanding to take its technology into Egypt.

The agreement brings in three local partners: Modon Misr for Asset and Facility Management, transport services provider Mwasalat Misr, and Redcon Properties. They control the ground. Parkin brings the cameras and the software.

What the Egypt agreement covers

The partners plan to deploy Automatic Number Plate Recognition parking systems, AI-enabled parking cameras, barrierless entry, digital permits and parking management platforms across assets the Egyptian companies already run. They will also work out technical, operational and commercial models that suit the Egyptian market.

Read that carefully. An MoU is a framework, not a contract. No sites, dates or pricing have been fixed.

Parkin says the goal is better parking efficiency and a smoother experience for drivers in Egypt’s growing cities. Chief Executive Mohamed Abdulla Al Ali called the deal a step in the company’s regional expansion, and said technology, data and operational know-how would carry the weight in building parking systems that work.

Inside Parkin’s regional growth plans

Line up the past four months and the pattern gets obvious.

In May, Parkin Company PJSC signed a long-term framework agreement with Sharjah master developer Arada, covering up to 9,900 spaces at the Aljada megaproject, phased between 2026 and 2030. The smart paid parking system there went live on 15 July, the company’s first paid operation outside Dubai. On 10 August came an MoU with Abu Dhabi’s Q Mobility, the operator behind Mawaqif, aimed at linking digital payments and AI-driven occupancy management across the two emirates.

Egypt is the first step outside the country altogether. Parkin’s regional growth plans have moved from one emirate to three markets in under four months, and every deal so far has been a partnership rather than a purchase.

Why the technology travels

Parkin holds a 49-year concession over Dubai’s paid public parking. That covered roughly 229,000 spaces at the end of 2025 and 141 million transactions last year. Volume at that scale teaches a system what a busy Thursday evening looks like, and that learning is the exportable part.

Think of a car park as a checkout lane. The old version needed a ticket, a barrier, and a queue behind whoever lost their ticket. The smart parking solutions UAE operators have been rolling out since 2024 read the plate on the way in, start the clock, and charge the wallet on the way out. Nobody stops. Nobody hunts for coins.

That model does not care which country the tarmac sits in, which is why Parkin smart parking systems can move across borders faster than physical infrastructure usually does.

What Egyptian drivers could see

Egypt keeps building new cities and communities, and each one arrives with parking demand attached. Modon Misr chief executive Mohamed Aboutaleb said the partnership could support how parking and mobility develop as that construction continues.

For now, nothing is switched on. The partners still have to agree on what the technology costs, who operates it, and where it lands first. Parkin Egypt remains an intention on paper.

Watch the next announcement instead. If a named development and a go-live date appear, the Egypt move stops being exploratory and starts being a business.

  • 3 min read
Iran trade suspension in the UAE
  • UAE

Iran trade suspension in the UAE took effect late on August 18, covering all trade, commercial exchanges, and financial transactions until further notice. Afra Al Hameli, director of the strategic communications department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, announced the decision. She cited regional escalations undermining regional and international peace and security. Officials gave no end date.

Abu Dhabi moved hours after its Ministry of Defence said air defences detected two ballistic missiles launched from Iran toward the country. One fell outside UAE territorial waters, and the second landed inside them. Neither caused reported damage or casualties.

Tehran rejected the account. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei called the claim baseless. He said such accusations run against the principle of good neighbourliness and damage efforts to build trust among regional states.

What the Iran trade suspension in the UAE covers

The scope of the Iran trade suspension in the UAE reaches beyond merchandise. Banks, shipping lines, logistics operators and commodity traders with Iranian exposure face a blanket prohibition on payments and commercial dealings. Firms holding open contracts have no published guidance on wind-down periods or exemptions. Implementation details will decide how hard the measure bites.

UAE-Iran trade has run through Dubai for decades. Mark Kimmitt, a retired US general and former assistant secretary of state, told Al Jazeera the emirate had quietly become Iran’s largest supplier, ahead of China and Turkiye, providing roughly a third of Iranian imports each year. On that estimate, the embargo could cut deeper than measures Washington has imposed.

A brief reopening now reversed

Direct cargo shipping between the two countries stopped in early March, days after the war began. Sailings resumed in late June through Dubai’s Jebel Ali Port. That window lasted under two months.

Authorities also suspended roaming services for Iranian mobile users in the UAE ahead of the trade decision, cutting calls, messages and banking access for residents and travellers. Shipping and oil market fallout. Strait of Hormuz shipping remains close to a standstill. Kpler data show 10 crossings on Monday and two on Sunday. Five-day average traffic sits near 10 transits, against roughly 130 daily before the war.

A vessel sailing outbound through the strait took a hit from an unknown projectile early on Tuesday. UKMTO reported damage to the engine room and one crew death. Oman’s coastguard assisted the surviving crew. Brent crude oil price settled above $91 a barrel on Tuesday as traders weighed the risk of a longer closure. Roughly 25 percent of seaborne crude and petroleum product trade, and about 19 percent of liquefied natural gas, passed through the strait in 2025.

Diplomacy stalled

Iran trade suspension in the UAE lands one day after the 60-day window tied to the June 17 US-Iran memorandum of understanding expired without a final deal. President Donald Trump said Washington holds no talks with Tehran and has none scheduled. He also said the strait is open and cleared of mines, a claim transit data does not support.

UAE-Iran relations had shown tentative improvement earlier in the summer. Abu Dhabi has denied claims that frozen Iranian funds were released or moved through its banking system. Whether the Iran trade suspension in the UAE proves temporary will depend on the missile investigation and on any return to negotiations.

  • 3 min read
Ministry upgrades the online service
  • Trade

The paper form that once stood between a business owner and a protected brand name has been retired for anyone preparing to register a trademark in Bahrain. Officials at the Bahrain Ministry of Industry and Commerce have rebuilt the service for registering trademarks and service marks in a single class, trimming the documents, approvals, and time an application used to require. An online trademark application now replaces the paper file.

The change looks small. Its reach runs wider than the form it replaced.

Inside the upgraded service

Applications face a technical and legal review first, then move into the later stages of registration. The ministry has simplified the steps, reworked the interface and turned paper forms into electronic ones. It has also standardised service information published across different channels, so an applicant reads the same instructions wherever they look.

Eman Ahmed Al Doseri, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, said the upgrade belongs to a continuing review of ministry services and delivery standards, meant to improve efficiency and give customers clearer sight of what each procedure involves. She added that the ministry stays committed to shaping services around what beneficiaries need, while raising service quality and the effectiveness of its work system.

Sound, scent and a single class

Al Doseri explained that applicants can now register a trademark in Bahrain electronically, covering a national trademark or service mark in one class under the Nice International Classification of Goods and Services. Visible marks qualify, including words and images. So do marks nobody can see. Sound marks and scent marks sit inside the service, subject to approved requirements.

The Nice Classification groups goods and services into numbered classes used across most of the world. One class is the boundary here. Bahrain does not accept applications covering several classes at once, so a company selling both software and clothing files twice.

What it takes to register a trademark in Bahrain

Trademark registration in Bahrain runs through the Trademark Office at the Industrial Property Directorate, where nationals and residents of the kingdom file directly, while foreign applicants living outside Bahrain work through IP registration agents or law firms authorised by the directorate. Protection lasts ten years from the application date, and holders can renew it for further terms. 

Legislative Decree No. 11 of 2006 sets the rules. Businesses that register a trademark in Bahrain gain rights they can enforce against unauthorised use, counterfeiting, or imitation. Bahrain also belongs to the Madrid Protocol, so a company can reach the market by extending an international registration rather than filing locally.

After examination, the ministry publishes an accepted mark, and third parties get 60 days to oppose it. Errors made at filing tend to surface at that stage. Where nothing is contested, guides to the process put the wait from filing to registration at roughly six months. 

A wider push on government services

The trademark work sits inside a broader re-engineering of public services. More than 1,300 government services have been documented, translated and published. Around 800 more are being developed and re-engineered across government sectors.

Proposals and feedback shape the queue. They arrive through Tawasul, the national system for suggestions and complaints, through investor feedback, and through secret shopper reports assessing government services. Guidance manuals and service-level agreements have followed.

For a small company weighing whether to register a trademark in Bahrain, the calculation now turns less on paperwork and more on the choice of class and the strength of the mark itself.

  • 3 min read
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