Today, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud launched the investment and privatization project for sports clubs, following the completion of the executive procedures for the first phase. This initiative aims to achieve the targets of Saudi Vision 2030 in the sports sector, which seeks to build an effective sports sector by stimulating and empowering the private sector to contribute to the development of sports, thereby enhancing the performance of national teams, sports clubs, and practitioners at all levels.
The project currently includes two main pathways: the first involves approving the investment of major companies and developmental entities in sports clubs in exchange for transferring ownership of these clubs to them. The second pathway involves offering several sports clubs for privatization starting from the fourth quarter of 2023.
The project is based on three strategic objectives: creating quality opportunities and an attractive investment environment in the sports sector to achieve a sustainable sports economy; enhancing professionalism and administrative and financial governance in sports clubs; and improving club standards and developing their infrastructure to provide the best services to sports fans, which will positively reflect on enhancing the audience's experience, according to the Saudi Press Agency "SPA."
The overall goal of transferring and privatizing clubs is to achieve significant advancements in various sports in the Kingdom by 2030, aiming to cultivate a generation distinguished in sports on both regional and global levels. The initiative also focuses on developing football and its competitions in particular, with the aim of placing the Saudi league among the top 10 leagues in the world, increasing the revenue of the Saudi Professional League from 450 million riyals to over 1.8 billion riyals annually, and raising the market value of the Saudi Professional League from 3 billion to over 8 billion riyals.
