Saudi Arabia · Open market · Operating partnership
Access on this page: Signed: Saudi Sign Language — pending How this page is tested
This page in sign language
Signed end to end by a Deaf creator, credited by name. International Sign on the global site; your national sign language on your country page.
ally is a platform where creators make sign language, captions and audio description — and one API delivers it to any screen. We are looking for the partner who will build the Saudi operation with us.
Why we are looking for a partner
One partner video — spoken, captioned and signed by a creator we already work with. It is shared across every open-market page. We do not fake a local signer to look established here.
The people
Saudi Arabia's Deaf community signs Saudi Sign Language. The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Law — Cabinet Resolution 110 of 22 August 2023, Royal Decree M/27 of 27 August, published 8 September 2023 — names sign language as a required means of communication (Article 2), grants a right to written, visual and audio content (Article 14), and punishes discrimination with up to two years' imprisonment or SAR 500,000 (Articles 22 and 26). The Authority for the Care of Persons with Disabilities oversees it.
In plain words
Below is who lives here and what reaches them. Every number on this page is a research seed, not an audited claim — we mark them, rather than publish numbers we cannot yet stand behind.
Why captions alone do not close this gap → Why sign language
The mandate
Cabinet Resolution 110 of 6/2/1445 (22 August 2023); Royal Decree M/27 of 11/2/1445 (27 August 2023); published 23/2/1445 (8 September 2023). 33 articles. Article 2: alternative and appropriate methods of communication including sign language. Article 14: right to access written, visual and audio content. Article 22: up to two years' imprisonment or SAR 500,000, doubled for children and the elderly. Article 26: non-governmental entities up to SAR 500,000, doubled on repeat. Article 24: the Public Prosecution investigates. Enforcing authority: the Authority for the Care of Persons with Disabilities.
'Saudi Arabia: New Law Regulating Rights of Persons with Disabilities Promulgated' — English summary of the decree and its structure.
Obligated buyers: government entities under the law's prohibitions, every non-governmental entity under Article 26, broadcasters and content providers under Article 14's access right, and the entertainment and cinema sector built since 2018.
The gap
Saudi compliance has the strongest penalties on this site and no definition of what a signed or described screen is. Article 14's right to content has no quota, no format and no deadline attached; the interpreter pool is small; and the regional 'unified' sign language competes with the community's own for the few interpreter chairs that exist. Vision 2030 has built cinemas, platforms and entertainment at a pace no other market matches — almost none of it accessible in Saudi Sign Language.
What we bring
These are patterns, not promises — each one happened somewhere, and each carries its source. The place is abstracted because the pattern is what transposes.
Pattern
A replicable template: the ordinance language, the budget logic and the service behind it travel together. Any city can copy it.
Two city ordinances — one on healthcare accessibility, one on cinema accessibility — have passed first reading, with ally as technical partner.
Receipt: Parañaque City Council records
Pattern
The platform exists before the first contract. Buyers pay for a service, not for research.
ally's pre-operating research and development was supported by a national science research grant and a city government grant.
Receipt: company fact
Pattern
Real usage, real feedback, and the model for any school or district that wants signed content on what students already watch.
A telco-funded 2021 pilot brought the platform to a Deaf school community of about 800 users.
Receipt: company fact
We publish our signals — including the zeros — on the impact page.
The partnership
The structure is a licensed market operation, built with the local community. Terms are discussed directly.
The playbook
The partner
Operators with standing in accessibility, media, telecom, or government services. Deaf-led organisations and entrepreneurs are explicitly welcome — the best operator of an accessibility market may come from the community itself. Investors are welcome alongside an operator, or to introduce one.
Why now
The law is two years old, the Authority is writing the regulations that give Article 14 shape, and the penalties are severe enough that obligated entities will want a compliant supplier before the first prosecution. A partner with Saudi Sign Language delivery by paid Deaf creators arrives while 'visual and audio content' is still being defined.
A playbook that works in one Gulf market travels: the same broadcasters, the same operators and the same Deaf-led institutions work across the GCC from Dubai, Riyadh and Doha — and each country keeps its own sign language, which is why these are separate pages.
Next step
Write to us — by form, by email, or with a signed or spoken video message. From there: an introductory call, an NDA, the Saudi market dossier, then terms.
Questions