DAMMAM — Saudi Aramco has signed a memorandum of understanding with King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) to establish a new center of excellence for artificial intelligence at the university’s headquarters.

The agreement aims to support research and development efforts and market advanced artificial intelligence technologies by addressing the impacts of work at Saudi Aramco at a sustainable institutional level instead of individual projects.

The memorandum was signed at the university headquarters in Thuwal by Saudi Aramco's Vice President of Digital Transformation Nabil Al-Nuaim and Vice President for Research at KAUST Dr. Donal Bradley.

Al-Nuaim said on this occasion: “Saudi Aramco has made steps to accelerate the growth of artificial intelligence, push forward the digital transformation and adopt artificial intelligence. The AI excellence center combines leading innovations of digital transformation adopted by Saudi Aramco and the globally accredited academic excellence at KAUST. This unique opportunity provides a system based on research inside Saudi Arabia for industry leaders, academic decision-makers and international partners to meet and exchange and transfer knowledge to develop AI solutions and spread and market them globally to create a sustainable research environment in this field.”

For his part, Dr. Bradley commented saying: “The new excellence center will provide a joint framework for working with Saudi Aramco in a close way to develop proper and quick solutions for the needs of the energy sector, among other relevant sectors, in addition to training the cadres necessary to improve the development pace in this vital and important sector. We at KAUST look forward for this center to contribute to deepening our strategic partnership with Saudi Aramco and to provide the basic inputs necessary to realize the ambitions of the Saudi Vision 2030.”

Under the agreement, the new AI excellence center seeks to develop research skills, improve products and commercial marketing and entrepreneurship in Saudi Arabia by creating unique opportunities for research and advanced development of AI, based on globally distinguished data groups. The center also seeks to be an advanced model in research and development in Saudi Arabia.

The center aims to benefit from the latest AI technologies, putting Saudi Aramco and KAUST as global leaders in this field by establishing an AI platform for the researchers of the university and the company to exchange knowledge, incubate technologies and increase their contributions and influence at the global level. — SPA