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Since establishing its regional headquarters in Riyadh, Snowflake has been deepening its commitment to Saudi Arabia by enabling businesses to drive business value from their data. Ali Al-Ismail’ s appointment as Country Manager further reinforces this strategy.

Al-Ismail’ s focus is on expanding Snowflake’ s local presence by fostering strong relationships with customers, government entities, and partners, while driving adoption across key sectors such as oil and gas, manufacturing, retail, and the public sector.

Snowflake supports Saudi Arabia’ s Vision 2030 and beyond, and is committed to enabling AI-driven use cases that will accelerate digital transformation and unlock greater business value. Additionally, through its One Million Minds programme, Snowflake is empowering Saudi talent by providing cutting-edge AI skills and training, equipping the next generation for the future of work.

What strengths and skills do you bring to your role?

With 20 years of experience in sales leadership and business development, Al-Ismail has built a strong foundation in the technology sector, particularly within

oil and gas, utilities, and mid-market enterprises. Al-Ismail has held senior roles at Oracle, Microsoft, Cisco, and Alcatel, leading high-performing sales and channel teams, driving SaaS adoption, and achieving significant business growth.

His expertise in strategic relationship management, sales execution, and fostering innovation is key to Snowflake’ s expansion in Saudi Arabia. These skills enable Al-Ismail to help organisations harness the power of data, optimise decision-making, and drive meaningful business outcomes.

How do you address the expectations of your end customers? What challenges are they facing today?

Saudi Arabia is undergoing a major digital transformation as part of Vision 2030, with

Snowflake’ s AI Data Cloud, deployed on Google Cloud Dammam, empowers organisations to meet local data residency requirements while harnessing AI-driven insights.

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