It ranks first in the Middle East and Africa... and ninth among the G-20 countries

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) announced the Kingdom's classification in the highest levels of the "Digital Regulatory Maturity Index" for telecom regulators around the world, "level five", after its success in building a sustainable and homogeneous regulatory framework and the transition towards cooperative regulation, to be ranked first in the Middle East and Africa, and ninth among G20 countries.

Through Vision 2030, the Kingdom has succeeded in empowering the ICT sector and setting an ambitious strategy to transform into a “digital regulator” in line with global trends in this field, by launching a number of initiatives to develop the ICT sector’s regulations and bring it to the highest levels of organizational maturity globally. Where it established the National Regulatory Committee as a strategic step to provide an attractive and stimulating regulatory environment for various sectors, promote investment in the digital economy and accelerate digital transformation, and achieve the highest level of coordination between regulators, as well as harmonization in the regulation of common digital issues between entities, in the interest of promoting The digital regulatory environment in various vital sectors.

The International Telecommunication Union indicated that the criteria for classifying the regulatory maturity of the telecommunications and information technology sector bodies and organizations in the world revolve around measuring the extent of the sector's development and keeping pace with its regulations for digital developments and the extent of government cooperation, in addition to aspects related to services provided to subscribers, the investment environment for service providers, and the organizational style of the sector regulator, by adopting 50 criteria for classifying telecom regulators around the world and dividing them into several levels, the highest of which is the "fifth level", which includes countries with cooperative regulation between regulators from the telecommunications and information technology sector and other sectors to advance digital transformation, while the union ranks the first level as a minimum for sector regulators in countries with markets monopoly communications.

It is noteworthy that the organizational journey of the telecommunications sector in the Kingdom extends for about 100 years, starting since the launch of the Directorate of Post, Telegraph and Telephone in 1924 AD.

Since the establishment of the Communications Commission in 2001, the Kingdom has been able to bring about radical reforms that have contributed to raising its international classification to the "fifth level" as one of the most mature regulators around the world, and these organizational successes are reflected in the improvement of services, the doubling of the number of licensed companies and the growth in Internet speed, by about 1,548 % over the past four years.