By Diplomacy Journal Lee Kap-soo

Seongnam City Mayor Shin Sang-jin and Saudi Arabia's Ambassador to the Republic of Korea Sami M. Alsadhan met at the city hall on Feb. 6 to discuss cooperation plans to foster high-tech industries between the two countries, the city of Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, announced.

The meeting was held in conjunction with the city's game and cultural content industry, which has developed around Pangyo Techno Valley, and Saudi Arabia's willingness to foster the technology industry.

Pangyo Techno Valley is the largest concentration of the game industry in Korea, with about 200 related companies, including major companies such as Nexon and NCsoft.

Based on this, Seongnam City aims to expand global cooperation in the fields of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, including gaming, artificial intelligence (AI), and information and communication technology (ICT).

“Saudi Arabia is very interested in the gaming industry, as well as AI and ICT,” said Ambassador Alsadhan, ”and we look forward to working with Seongnam City to develop a fruitful relationship between our two high-tech industries.”

He added, “We would like to specifically discuss ways to combine Saudi culture with Seongnam's excellent game content.”

Mayor Shin said, “Seongnam City has a developed gaming and cultural content industry centered on Pangyo Techno Valley,” adding, “I hope that the two countries will build a partnership and create synergy.”

Seongnam City plans to develop a sustainable cooperation model with Saudi Arabia based on this meeting and continue to discuss details.