The CEO of Saudi Arabia's planned futuristic city has seen his own future take a turn. Nadhmi al-Nasr has "abruptly" left the job he has held since 2018, reports the Wall Street Journal. No reason was given, but the paper notes the project has been dogged by rising costs and major blunders, with Saudi officials acknowledging they don't have the funds to carry out all the elements to the project they had planned. Executives with Public Investment Fund—that's the country's sovereign-wealth fund—are being brought in to oversee the project. Aiman al-Mudaifer, who heads up PIF's Local Real Estate Division, has been named acting CEO, reports NBC News.
"As Neom enters a new phase of delivery, this new leadership will ensure operational continuity, agility and efficiency to match the overall vision and objectives of the project," Neom said. The Journal reports Neom is set to cover an area the size of Massachusetts, and plans had called for a marquee element to be a 105-mile-long city in the desert, known as "the Line," with 9 million people living in a pair of skyscrapers taller than the Empire State Building. But those plans have been scaled back, with phase one pared down from a 10-mile portion to a 1.5-mile segment.
Al-Nasr isn't the only exec to leave this year, and the Journal reads into the departures, writing they "could signal a shift in focus by Saudi officials from Neom to other investments across the country. When Neom was announced in 2017, Saudi officials viewed the project as a way to initiate change in the once-conservative Islamic kingdom without moving too quickly in the biggest cities, Riyadh and Jeddah. Since then, Prince Mohammed's moves to liberalize his economy have rapidly changed the kingdom as a whole, with a huge increase in women joining the labor force and an influx of foreign investors setting up offices in the capital. Some Neom employees now argue that there is little need for a separate part of the country with its own laws and regulations." (More Neom stories.)
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