Sharqieh Ltd. and Mineral-Exploration Projects in Arabia (1926-1960)

Sharqieh Ltd. was a foreign company opened its branch in Jeddah in 1926, where Harry St. J. Philby managed this branch. It was engaged in various commercial activities in the Arabian Peninsula until it was liquidated in 1960. Though the company had won Saudi government's confidence and succeeded in almost all of its projects, it failed to obtain any contracts for mineral extraction, despite continuous efforts in this regard. The study discusses the efforts exerted by the company to obtain concessions in mineral mining and investment and the reasons for their failure. The study has applied the historical analytical method and has derived information from various sources. The most important of these are Philby’s papers in The Middle East Centre, Saint Antony College, Oxford, and UK National Archive documents, along with some documents archived in The King Abdulaziz Foundation in Riyadh.