From Ambition to Defensible Decisions: Why Feasibility Is the Missing Infrastructure of Vision 2030's Final Phase

Executive summary

Vision 2030 has entered its third and final phase. The Kingdom's 2025 annual report says 93% of Vision KPIs met or exceeded their annual targets. Non-oil activities now make up 55% of real GDP, and the private sector contributes 51%. The question for the remaining years is no longer whether Saudi Arabia can mobilise capital. It is whether every riyal goes to projects that can stand up to scrutiny. That depends on something that rarely features in strategy documents: the quality of the feasibility study behind each decision. Jadwai was founded in Riyadh in 2026 to make rigorous, multi-dimensional feasibility analysis available at the scale this phase requires.

The scale of what has to be decided

The size of the investment agenda is easy to underestimate. Saudi Arabia's National Investment Strategy estimates that delivering Vision 2030 needs more than SAR 12 trillion of cumulative investment. It aims to raise annual investment, measured as gross fixed capital formation, to SAR 2 trillion by 2030 (about 30% of GDP), and to lift net foreign direct investment from SAR 17 billion in 2019 to SAR 388 billion a year by 2030.

Privatisation has moved from building frameworks to delivering projects. The National Privatization Strategy, approved in November 2025 and launched publicly by the National Center for Privatization & PPP in January 2026, targets more than 220 PPP contracts and SAR 240 billion of private capital investment by 2030, with more than 145 priority opportunities identified. The Ministry of Finance's FY2027 Pre-Budget Statement reports 10 privatisation and PPP projects launched in the first half of 2026 alone, including the Qassim airport PPP, and new contracts signed for the SABIC Mental Health Hospital and the Jubail Container Terminal, bringing the total number of signed partnership contracts to 83.

SMEs are being asked to do more as well. The Kingdom now has about 1.7 million SMEs employing roughly 8.8 million people, and their contribution to GDP has reached 22.9%. The Vision target is 35% by 2030, and the National Strategy for Entrepreneurship and SMEs, launched in September 2026 with 13 initiatives, is designed to get there.

Government spending carries its own evidence requirement. Under the Ministry of Finance's budget execution instructions for 2026, a government entity's operational or capital cost request must be supported by a feasibility study covering five axes: Strategic, Economic, Commercial, Financial and Administrative.

Behind each of these figures are thousands of separate decisions to build, tender, fund, expand or decline. Each one deserves an evidence base.

The problem: feasibility is slow, expensive and scarce

A proper feasibility study answers the most expensive question in any capital decision: will this actually work? Done properly, it is specialist work: costly, slow and dependent on scarce expertise. As a result, most projects get a thinner version or none at all, and capital ends up committed on partial evidence.

That gap matters differently to each part of the Vision 2030 ecosystem:

• Government entities preparing budget requests, capital projects or PPP candidates need studies that answer all five MoF axes and stand up to review. They need more of them than the advisory market can supply, especially as privatisation opportunities move through expression-of-interest, qualification and proposal stages across many sectors at once.
• SMEs and entrepreneurs looking at expansion, new product lines or first-round funding are usually priced out of rigorous analysis. They fall back on spreadsheets or templates that few boards or financiers find convincing.
• Investors and financiers need independent, standardised analysis to screen opportunities and stress-test sponsor assumptions. When sponsor studies are inconsistent, comparison is costly.
• Accelerators and incubators need consistent, comparable output across whole cohorts, not one-off reports of uneven quality.

Weak feasibility shows up later, as cost overruns, stalled procurements and SME failures. In a phase focused on delivery and returns, a poor early decision costs more.

How Jadwai addresses it

Jadwai is a Saudi technology company, founded in Riyadh in 2026, that turns the discipline of a feasibility study into software. It is a decision-support product for capital-intensive choices, not a business-plan template. Users enter project details through guided questionnaires. The platform checks those inputs against trusted local and international data sources and sector and country benchmarks, uses AI to help structure and draft the analysis, and produces a customisable report in PDF or Word. Every figure is tagged either to a source or to a stated assumption.

One integrated framework, nine dimensions

Every Jadwai study rests on the Jadwai Feasibility Framework, which assesses nine dimensions in one integrated analysis:

1. Strategic: alignment with long-term goals, commitment and capability, and for government projects, fit with national and sector strategy and any duplication with other initiatives. (MoF study)
2. Economic: cost-benefit, resource efficiency and wider value to the economy and society, including needs and options appraisal. (MoF study)
3. Market: real demand, market size, target audience, buying patterns and competition.
4. Commercial: for private projects, positioning, pricing and channels. For government projects, the funding and procurement case: market appetite, delivery and procurement route, and funding options such as the regular budget, PPP or revenue sharing, with a preferred option. (MoF study)
5. Technical: technology, equipment, infrastructure capacity and the team's ability to deliver.
6. Financial: costs, revenues, returns and cash flows, and for government projects, the basis of the cost estimate and the ability to fund operation after delivery. (MoF study)
7. Legal: compliance, licensing, intellectual property and legal exposure.
8. Operational: whether the operating model, processes and resources can deliver at steady state.
9. Administrative: governance, organisation structure, roles and responsibilities, workforce and Saudization plan, KPIs and the delivery roadmap. (MoF study)

Five of these dimensions are the studies the Ministry of Finance requires for government-funded projects. The other four (Market, Technical, Legal and Operational) feed them. Operational is not one of the five MoF studies, but it often decides whether the Financial and Administrative cases hold up in practice. Each dimension ends with its own verdict, and the report closes with an integrated verdict: a weighted score, a Go / No-Go decision, and the conditions attached to it.

For Vision 2030 stakeholders, the "softer" dimensions matter as much as the financial ones. A project can be financially attractive and still fail on its procurement route, licensing, governance or workforce localisation. Putting all of these into one study, rather than leaving them for later, is what makes the output usable for decisions.

Built for portfolios, not single studies

Few entities make one capital decision at a time. A ministry preparing its budget request, a municipal development company with a slate of assets, or a fund screening a pipeline all face the same task: compare many options on the same basis. Jadwai supports multiple projects and multiple feasibility studies per project, and can merge them into one consolidated executive summary. A board or steering committee then sees one view of the whole portfolio, with every underlying study still traceable to its sources and assumptions.

Four rules that govern every report

Jadwai is built on four rules: evidence over assertion (every figure traces to a source or a stated assumption), method in the open (assumptions, formulas and sensitivities stay visible), built for the decision (the reader should be able to commit or decline with confidence), and Arabic first, not translated (the product is designed in Arabic and English together). For a government reviewer or credit committee, a study that can be interrogated is worth more than one that only looks polished.

Products: three available now, three coming soon

• Jadwai Quick Check (available): a concise one-page report for a rapid go / no-go recommendation, with dynamic tuning that updates results and ratios as assumptions change.
• Jadwai Professional (available): the detailed study that gives entrepreneurs and early investors a clear view of financial and market viability.
• Jadwai Enterprise (available): in-depth, multi-dimensional analysis for government and high-stakes projects, covering the five MoF studies alongside the supporting dimensions.
• Jadwai Market Scout, Jadwai Expert Nexus and Jadwai Capital Link (coming soon): on our roadmap for idea discovery, specialist interpretation and investor-ready packaging. They are not available yet.

Mapping Jadwai to Vision 2030 themes

The programs below are referenced as public context. Jadwai is an independent company and is not affiliated with, or endorsed by, the entities named.

A Thriving Economy: SME growth. Raising SMEs' share of GDP to 35% depends on more SME proposals that are well evidenced. Jadwai Quick Check and Professional give founders the kind of structured, evidence-traced analysis that has usually been out of their reach. For accelerators and incubators, standardised output means cohorts can be compared on a like-for-like basis.

A Thriving Economy: private-sector participation and the National Privatization Strategy. With more than 220 PPP contracts targeted by 2030, privatisation needs more feasibility capacity than the advisory market can add. The study that matters most at the start of a PPP is often the one that is least understood: the Commercial case in its government sense, meaning market appetite, procurement route and funding options. Jadwai Enterprise treats that case, along with the Legal, Operational and Administrative dimensions, as part of one integrated study. Our co-founder Mohammad Salem brings more than 20 years of public-sector experience in privatisation and financial sustainability to the product's design.

A Thriving Economy: investment attraction and the National Investment Strategy. The National Investment Strategy focuses on developing strong, diverse investment opportunities. Investors and financiers can use Jadwai for independent, standardised screening of opportunities and stress-testing of sponsor assumptions, and the consolidated executive summary lets them compare several opportunities side by side.

Industrial, mining and logistics development (NIDLP) and the PIF Program. NIDLP is in a delivery-and-expansion phase that supports large-scale investments and sectoral transformation, and the Integrated Strategy for Mining and Mineral Industries explicitly lists "enhance the economic feasibility of projects" as a strategic objective. The PIF Program places growing emphasis on crowding in private investment. Every private co-investor, supplier and local-content partner entering these value chains needs its own feasibility case. Jadwai's Technical, Economic and Financial dimensions, supported by industry and country benchmarks, are designed for that kind of capital-intensive assessment.

An Ambitious Nation: government effectiveness and the National Transformation Program. NTP works to make government more effective and to improve infrastructure and service delivery. Jadwai replaces a manual, document-driven feasibility process with a governed digital one: assumptions stay visible, outputs follow one structure, and many studies roll up into a single executive summary. For entities that run many initiatives at once, that is a governance gain as much as an efficiency gain.

Data and AI ambition (the National Strategy for Data & AI). The National Strategy for Data & AI aims to stimulate data and AI adoption and build a thriving local ecosystem, including around 300 data and AI startups by 2030, and 2026 has been designated the Kingdom's Year of AI. Jadwai is a Saudi company applying AI to a high-value decision process. AI helps structure and check the analysis, while the method, the sources and the final judgement stay visible to the people accountable for the decision. Its feasibility know-how was built in Saudi Arabia and designed in Arabic.

Alignment at a glance

Looking ahead

The third phase of Vision 2030 will be judged on returns and resilience: whether projects deliver what their business cases promised. That raises the bar for the business cases. Organisations whose feasibility studies are traceable, comparable and honest about risk will be best placed to win capital, pass procurement gates and keep their stakeholders' confidence. A national transformation of this size needs feasibility capability at national scale, built locally, in Arabic, and available to the SME founder in Hail as well as to the ministry in Riyadh.

An invitation

If your entity, fund, accelerator or company is preparing a pipeline of capital decisions for 2027 and beyond, we would welcome the chance to show you how a standardised, evidence-led feasibility process could support it. Request a demo at https://www.jadwai.com/en/contact, or write to info@jadwai.com.

• Jadwai's nine-dimension feasibility platform
• Jadwai Enterprise
• feasibility for government-funded projects
• AI-assisted feasibility analysis

Our Insight, Your Decisions.

Sources

1. Saudi Vision 2030, Annual Report 2025 (93% of KPIs on target; non-oil 55% of real GDP; private sector 51%; SMEs about 1.7 million, about 8.8 million jobs, 22.9% of GDP; VRP descriptions; Mining strategy objective "enhance the economic feasibility of projects"): https://www.vision2030.gov.sa/media/ecdjfopq/vision2030_annual_report_2025_en.pdf
2. Saudi Vision 2030, 2025 Annual Report overview page: https://www.vision2030.gov.sa/en/annual-reports
3. Saudi Vision 2030, A Thriving Economy (SME contribution to GDP from 20% to 35%): https://www.vision2030.gov.sa/en/overview/pillars/a-thriving-economy
4. Ministry of Finance, Pre-Budget Statement FY 2027 (National Privatization Strategy approved November 2025; 10 privatisation/PPP projects launched in H1 2026; 83 signed partnership contracts; SAR 240bn target; National Strategy for Entrepreneurship and SMEs launched September 2026 with 13 initiatives; Year of AI): https://www.mof.gov.sa/en/budget/Documents/Pre-Budget%20Statement%20for%20FY%202027.pdf
5. Ministry of Finance, Instructions for Executing the State General Budget for 2026 (five-axes feasibility study for cost requests): https://www.mof.gov.sa/docslibrary/RegulationsInstructions/Documents/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%B9%D9%84%D9%8A%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%AA/%D8%AA%D8%B9%D9%84%D9%8A%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%AA%20%D8%AA%D9%86%D9%81%D9%8A%D8%B0%20%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D9%8A%D8%B2%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9%20%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%85%D8%A9%20%D9%84%D9%84%D8%AF%D9%88%D9%84%D8%A9%20%D9%84%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%85%202026%D9%85.pdf.pdf
6. Ministry of Investment, National Investment Strategy (FDI from SAR 17bn in 2019 to SAR 388bn in 2030; investment from 22% to 30% of GDP): https://misa.gov.sa/activities/national-investment-strategy/
7. Invest Saudi, Saudi Arabia's National Investment Strategy (investment need exceeding SAR 12 trillion; GFCF to SAR 2 trillion by 2030): https://www.investsaudi.sa/documents/national-strategies/national-investment-strategy.pdf
8. National Center for Privatization & PPP, National Privatization Strategy announcement via PR Newswire, 29 January 2026 (220+ PPP contracts and SAR 240bn by 2030; 145+ priority opportunities): https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/saudi-arabia-unveils-ambitious-new-privatization-strategy-to-expand-public-private-partnerships-302673974.html
9. Bird & Bird, Saudi Privatization and PPPs: What Foreign Companies Need to Prepare (2026) (procurement stages under way): https://www.twobirds.com/en/insights/2026/saudi-arabia/saudi-privatization-and-ppps--what-foreign-companies-need-to-prepare
10. SDAIA, National Strategy for Data & AI (objectives and KPIs): https://sdaia.gov.sa/en/SDAIA/SdaiaStrategies/Documents/NSDAI.pdf
11. SDAIA, Realizing Our Best Tomorrow, NSDAI strategy narrative, October 2020 (about 300 data and AI startups by 2030), hosted by OECD.AI: https://wp.oecd.ai/app/uploads/2021/12/Saudi_Arabia_National_Strategy_for_Data_and_AI_2020.pdf
12. Arab News, "Saudi annual Vision 2030 report shows most indicators achieve targets" (April 2026): https://www.arabnews.com/business/saudi-annual-vision-2030-report-shows-most-indicators-achieve-targets-2641250
13. Jadwai, company knowledge base (2026): all product, framework, company and founder statements.