90 million videos viewed daily on YouTube in KSA

More than 90 million videos are viewed on YouTube in the Kingdom daily, said Nawaf Al-Sahhaf, CEO of the Badir Technology Incubator Program, during an event to mark the first-ever local YouTube roadshow event at Riyadh’s Four Seasons Hotel on Wednesday.
YouTube representatives from around the globe are in the Kingdom to mark the event. The Badir program was launched by the King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology (KACST).
Daily views on YouTube have increased by 50 percent compared with 2012, with a staggering 167 million daily views in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region alone and 4 billion views globally, according to the latest statistics.
In addition, 60 hours of video footage are uploaded to YouTube per minute in the MENA region.
“The initiative aims to support and encourage Saudi entrepreneurs and pioneers to take advantage of YouTube in the development of their projects in line with the Badir objective to provide technical support to emerging entrepreneurs,” said Al-Sahhaf. “This program has been designed to develop the capacity of Saudi leaders and entrepreneurs in order to encourage a culture of self-employment in the next generation,” he said.
Statistics show that there are more than 13 million Internet users in the Kingdom, of whom more than 50 percent use Twitter and 42 percent use Facebook.
Al-Sahhaf reminded the audience that Saudi Arabia is the largest market for social networking sites in the region, with the largest number of YouTube users in the world, and that more than 60 percent of the Kingdom’s population use smartphones.
Two-thirds of YouTube users are between the ages of 18 and 34, of whom 83 percent use the Internet on a daily basis.
Marenco Kemp, head of YouTube EMEA Online Partnerships, said 1 billion people use YouTube every month, which is equivalent to one out of every two Internet users.
David Rupert, head of the EMEA YouTube team, said emphasis was placed on providing tremendous support to partners, content creators and guide content creators. Rupert also said that YouTube would launch a special website for Saudi Arabia.



Google, meanwhile, has created investment opportunities to facilitate business operations and strengthen partnerships with key stakeholders.