Saudi officials are talking to 7,000 companies around the world about opening regional headquarters in the kingdom, offering tax breaks and other incentives to turn their desert capital into a global business hub that rivals Dubai.

More than 40 multinational companies including Baker Hughes Co., KPMG and Schlumberger received licenses on Wednesday as part of the new program to facilitate business. The firms will get exemptions from work visa limits, eased regulations, and help with the relocation of staff, officials said. Other companies that have signed up include Deloitte, Pepsico, Unilever, Siemens Mobility and Philips, according to a presentation at an investment conference in Riyadh.

“The region simply has untapped potential and the largest untapped potential is the kingdom and the city of Riyadh,” Fahd Al-Rasheed, chief executive of the Royal Commission for Riyadh City, said in an interview. “We are going to make sure we take our share, which is going to be the lion’s share of the business in the region.”

Officials are talking to major companies with annual revenues of a billion dollars or more, Al-Rasheed said, with the aim of getting 480 of them to set up in Saudi Arabia by 2030. Around half the companies that received their permits this week had already signed agreements in January to relocate regional headquarters to Riyadh. The rest were new.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman wants to transform the capital into an international hub for business and talent – a push that’s increasingly posing a challenge to the neighboring United Arab Emirates, where free-wheeling Dubai has long been the regional home base for global firms. Competition is heating up as the prince overhauls the oil-dependent economy and eases social restrictions in the conservative Islamic kingdom, making Saudi Arabia – a significantly larger market – a more attractive place to do business.

Source: Aljazeera