---
title: "King Abdulaziz University"
type: "entity"
entity_kind: "concept"
status: "hub"
canonical_name: "King Abdulaziz University"
aliases: ["KAU"]
first_seen: "2026-07-09T00:00:00.000Z"
writer_model: "claude-sonnet-5"
connects_to: ["Highly Cited Researchers list","Clarivate","secondary-affiliation buying","King Saud University","Saudi Arabia higher-education strategy"]
---


The Jeddah university at the center of the Clarivate Highly Cited Researchers
(HCR) affiliation-buying case: reportedly offered top-cited foreign scientists
~$72,000/year contracts for a secondary affiliation starting 2014, saw its
primary-affiliation HCR count climb as part of the wider Saudi rise from 27
(2014) to 109 (2022), then fell hardest of any Saudi institution in the 2023
purge (31 → 12 HCRs) once Clarivate tightened its evaluation rules. Under an
independent counting method that includes secondary affiliations rather than
only primary ones, KAU ranks #2 worldwide by total HCR mentions — an order of
magnitude above its "primary affiliation" count, which is exactly the gap the
affiliation-buying scheme exploited.

## References

- [[claim-saudi-universities-bought-clarivate-highly-cited-researcher-status]]
- [[claim-clarivate-tightened-2023-hcr-evaluation-methodology]]
- [[claim-bornmann-bauer-2014-2015-independent-hcr-count-diverges-from-primary-affiliation-count]]