LEAP's operator commits to three more years of its Hong Kong show

Tahaluf, the joint venture that runs LEAP in Riyadh, has committed to three more years in Hong Kong, signing a strategic partnership with the territory's Innovation, Technology and Industry Bureau and its Tourism Board after the inaugural LEAP East closed with 25,000 attendees. The first edition ran over three days across 35,000 square metres, drawing 300 startups and 600 investors that organisers said represent more than $6.5 trillion in assets under management. Those are the organisers' own figures and follow a pre-event statement putting attending investor assets closer to $2 trillion; the two numbers were published at different points and have not been reconciled. The significance is structural rather than numerical. Until this year LEAP was a single event in a single city, and Tahaluf was an operating company built around it. Taking the format to a second market turns it into a brand with a licence to travel, which is the standard path for a successful exhibition — the model Informa, one of Tahaluf's shareholders, has run for decades across dozens of sectors. A three-year government-backed commitment is what makes that path viable, because exhibitions lose money in their first editions and only start returning once the exhibitor base rebooks. The choice of Hong Kong is a specific bet. The territory has spent several years trying to re-establish itself as a technology and capital hub after a difficult period for its international standing, and it has money and policy attention pointed at exactly that problem. An events operator arriving with a Gulf-built format and a government partner on each side is doing something more than renting a hall; it is being used as an instrument of a positioning strategy, in much the same way LEAP has been used in Riyadh. The competition formats travelled with it. LEAP's Rocket Fuel pitch competition ran a regional edition at the Hong Kong event with its own prize structure, which is how a show exports its ecosystem programming rather than only its floor plan. Twenty-five thousand attendees is a fraction of what the Riyadh event does — LEAP 2026 reported more than 200,000 across four days — but first editions are judged on whether they happen at all and whether the exhibitors come back. The three-year partnership is the answer to the second question before it was asked. For the Saudi side there is a less obvious benefit. Tahaluf is majority-owned through Saudi entities, and an events business that operates internationally is itself an export — a services company earning revenue abroad rather than a domestic show subsidised at home. That fits the argument the Saudi government has been making about becoming an exporter of capability rather than only a buyer. Financial terms of the Hong Kong partnership have not been published, and Tahaluf has not said whether further markets are under consideration. TechScoop is reporting from LEAP 2026 in Riyadh.