Saudi Gazette report

RIYADH — The Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) and the Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs and Housing launched a national portal to improve the Saudi urban landscape.

The launching ceremony was held on the sidelines of the first edition of the Global Smart City Forum 2024 in Riyadh on Monday. The two-day event is organized by SDAIA, in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs and Housing.

The platform aims to monitor the manifestations of visual distortion, identify data and analyze visual distortion using artificial intelligence technologies, in addition to raising the quality of life to achieve the goals of Vision 2030.

The two-day forum, which kicked off in Riyadh on Monday, brings together an elite group of world experts in the field of building smart cities and artificial intelligence to formulate a vision for the future of cities using smart solutions, and draw up basic rules that support their development plans to achieve sustainable urban development that enhances the quality of life.

In his inaugural speech, Minister of Municipal, Rural Affairs and Housing Majed Al-Hogail highlighted Saudi Arabia’s exceptional journey towards transformation that enabled to benefit from artificial intelligence technology and data to make a real and tangible impact on municipalities.

Addressing the forum, SDAIA President Dr. Abdullah Al-Ghamdi said that traffic and crowd management was supported through advanced analytics and artificial intelligence solutions, which led to a significant reduction in waiting time at the entry points to Makkah during the last Hajj season. He said that this plan was implemented in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior.