Saudi Arabia’s transformation into a global entertainment destination did not happen overnight. Riyadh Season, Saudi Arabia’s annual festival of sport and entertainment, was where the ambition first became visible, drawing millions of visitors across a calendar of concerts, activations, and world-class sporting events, including boxing nights that stopped the world. The undisputed heavyweight championship between Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk was one of them. Behind every one of those moments was infrastructure. And behind much of that infrastructure was stc group. That same logic is now shaping Saudi Arabia’s next major entertainment milestone. Qiddiya City is one of the Kingdom’s most ambitious giga-projects, a 360-square- kilometer destination forty-five kilometers outside Riyadh, designed from the ground up around entertainment, sports, and culture. Aquarabia, the Kingdom’s first water theme park of its kind, is among its flagship assets and experiences within the first city built for Play. As Aquarabia’s Official Premier Speed Partner, stc group is delivering the full digital backbone that a project of this scale demands. What makes stc’s contribution distinctive is not any single product or service. It is the breadth. Drawing on the capabilities of its subsidiaries, stc group delivers the full operational stack at Aquarabia: outdoor and indoor mobile coverage, dedicated internet access, critical communications, network infrastructure, cybersecurity, and the Aquatap wearable, a device that consolidates seamless digital guest experience into a single interface, managing guest flow across 22 rides and experiences, and 24 food and beverage, and 10 retail offerings. It is the kind of integrated offer that no single operator could replicate. But stc’s most consequential contribution at Aquarabia goes beyond the digital. Surftopia, presented by stc, is one of the Kingdom’s first surf pools, featuring customizable waves reaching a competitive two meters. Most surf facilities serve either tourists or seasoned surfers; Surftopia is built for everyone. It attracts international champions while developing the next generation of Saudi surfing talent. It is entertainment infrastructure that doubles as a sporting pipeline, the same model Saudi Arabia has applied in gaming, where stc provides the digital infrastructure powering the Esports World Cup as an Elite and Founding Partner. Through a five-year partnership with Qiddiya Investment Company, stc group is the long-term digital infrastructure partner for the entire destination as it grows. The goal is consistent across every sector the Kingdom has set its sights on: enrich lives, grow new passions, and make sure the infrastructure is never what holds any of it back. Where waves meet connectivity: stc group and the making of Aquarabia Qiddiya City
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