Exhibition Participation and Middle East Deployments... IT Industry Bustles as War Ends

Naver to Participate in Major Exhibition in Saudi Arabia
Nexon to Redeploy Staff to Middle East Operations

With the conclusion of peace negotiations between the United States and Iran, uncertainty in the Middle Eastern business environment has lifted, bringing renewed momentum to the domestic IT industry. Korean IT companies are confirming participation in large-scale IT exhibitions held annually in the Middle East, and are redeploying staff—previously recalled to Korea—to local subsidiaries, thus concretely resuming their business activities in the region.

According to the IT industry on June 16, NAVER plans to participate in "Cityscape Global 2026," which will be held in Saudi Arabia in the second half of this year. Cityscape Global is the largest real estate exhibition in the world, hosted by the Saudi Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs and Housing. Currently, NAVER is working with the Saudi government on digital transformation (DX) and AI transformation (AX) projects, and intends to explore further cooperation opportunities through the exhibition.

NAVER will also attend "LEAF 2026," a global technology exhibition in Saudi Arabia that was postponed in the first half of the year due to the war. At this event, NAVER plans to introduce its digital twin project and propose cooperation for AI technology development, thereby accelerating its business in the Middle East once again.

NAVER also plans to proceed as scheduled with the construction of a Saudi Arabia map-based "super application (app)" project, which was originally set for completion within this year. Chae Sun-joo, NAVER's Head of Strategic Business, who oversees global operations including the Middle East, is dedicating significant attention to the project, reportedly spending about half of each month in Saudi Arabia. Now that physical restrictions have been lifted due to the end of hostilities, NAVER can focus its resources on building the map app.

Chae serves as the Chairwoman of NAVER Innovation, an operational subsidiary under the Middle East regional headquarters "NAVER Arabia." NAVER Innovation is a joint venture established in May last year by NAVER Cloud and NHC Innovation, the digital subsidiary of Saudi Arabia's National Housing Company (NHC).

A NAVER Cloud representative stated, "We will proceed with the construction of the map app as scheduled. Our goal is to build a super app that incorporates various functions on top of the map app, and since the starting point is the map, we aim to launch it by the end of this year or early next year."

Kakao Mobility has signed a proof-of-concept (PoC) contract to supply integrated mobility solutions for the Diriyah Project, a smart city development initiative in Saudi Arabia. Now that uncertainty has been resolved with the peace agreement, the company plans to continue testing products related to the Diriyah Project as originally planned.

Game companies, which had reduced their Middle Eastern operations for safety reasons, are now sending employees back to the region and resuming their business. A Nexon representative commented, "Some employees who had been dispatched to the Middle East office are currently working remotely from Korea, but we plan to redeploy them after reviewing the appropriate timing for their return."

SAMSUNG SDS, a system integration (SI) company engaged in logistics, expressed expectations for a recovery in performance. A SAMSUNG SDS representative said, "The worsening situation in the Middle East negatively affected our logistics business, leading to poor first-quarter results. However, if the situation stabilizes and the Strait of Hormuz reopens, the sharply increased freight rates will normalize, and client cargo volumes will gradually return to previous levels."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.