The skies over Dubai are starting to buzz with drones operated by a Chinese company that has been licensed to deliver fast food, pharmaceuticals and other products to customers across the emirate.

Keeta Drone held a launch event on Tuesday that was attended by Dubai Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid. The prince, who is also the UAE’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense, was so impressed that he immediately authorized a 33% expansion of Keeta’s initial coverage area.

Keeta is a subsidiary of Beijing-based Meituan, a shopping platform and tech developer active in retail, restaurants, travel and entertainment. The drone itself can carry a payload of 2.5 kilograms and travel up to four kilometers per trip.

Across China, Meituan’s drones have become a popular means of ordering fried chicken from KFC through an app that can also be used to buy hot coffee, groceries and prescription drugs.

In an interview with The Circuit, Keeta President Yinian Mao talked about how the company managed to become the first drone delivery service to start flying in Dubai and its plans to launch its six-propeller aircraft into markets across the Middle East.

 What are your expansion plans beyond Dubai in the Middle East? 

We have been looking at different areas where we can deploy our kiosks. We see a lot of synergy here with medical supply, diagnostics, medicine, prescriptions, all these things. So that’s why we’re going to focus on two things. One is food and beverage. That’s our strength. And then the medical side. We then plan to expand to quite a few areas within Dubai. That’s for the next year, 2025. If we are looking beyond 2025, we are looking at other GCC countries, as well as in MENA.

Are you looking into hiring specialists from the UAE who can fly the drones?

Yes, for operating the drones. We are making expansion plans. We need maintenance crews. We need technicians. We need a skilled labor force. We need all this expertise. 

Can you tell us what kind of partnerships you are looking at here in Dubai as you expand to the city? 

We have two kinds of partnerships. One is with existing businesses, such as Fakeeh University Hospital or Americana. They have either restaurants or prescription drugs that we can deliver. The other partnership might be with those helping us maintain the drones. But right now, we are focusing on the first kind. 

How are you ensuring that your drones are safe?

Our drone is actually equipped with a lot of safety features, including redundant batteries, including motors. If you hit one motor and then disable it, the propulsion will be instantaneously transferred to the rest five. It will still be able to control itself. And including an onboard parachute that it will deploy in case of emergency. If it sees an obstacle in midair, it has something called send, detect and avoid capabilities to avoid obstacles…  to avoid collision in midair. We have, I think, one of the best track records in terms of operational safety for drone delivery. 

How long have you invested in terms of time to actually get the license in Dubai?

We’ve spent close to two years. So we have been planning since the beginning of 2023. There are some investigating phases, and then we did a flight demo here during the GITEX last year. Then, we went through a lot of validations and documentation reviews with DCAA and other regulatory bodies. I think it’s all worth it because, as you understand, we already got our operational license inside China. That was from 2021 to 2023. It took us two years here. Actually, it took us a little bit less time than the first time around because we have all this documentation and validation process with CAC, China’s Regulatory body for the Civil Aviation Authority of China.

Dubai’s property boom prompted Emaar, the city’s largest publicly traded developer, to provide shareholders with a big return. The move sent its stock soaring on Monday to a 17-year high.

The company, founded by Mohamed Alabbar, announced on Friday that it would declare dividends at 100% of its share capital starting with 2024 and continuing for the next few years.

Emaar said the new policy is aimed “at enhancing shareholder value while ensuring the financial sustainability and strategic growth” of the company.

The company’s 14% surge on the Dubai Financial Market on Monday led the exchange’s benchmark index to its highest level in almost a decade, rising 4.5%.

Meanwhile, Ali Sajwani, Managing Director of Damac Properties, says demand for Dubai property is growing among European customers, who are fleeing high taxes and regulatory changes to settle in the UAE.

“The customer base has shifted today,” Sajwani told The National. “The biggest customers are coming from Europe, no longer from Russia or Ukraine, and we believe that’s going to continue, and it’s going to grow further into 2025.”

Dubai’s benchmark stock index soared today to its highest in nearly 10 years amid expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve will cut interest rates this week.

The Dubai Financial Market’s General Index jumped 3.7% in morning trading to reach 5,010, led by Emirates NBD, Dubai’s largest bank, which rose 8%. The Fed’s decisions affect monetary policy in the Gulf, where the UAE dirham and other currencies are pegged to the U.S. dollar.

The stock surge comes as the UAE has embarked on a borrowing binge that promises to extend well into 2025, Bloomberg reports.

Emirati companies and sovereign entities in the UAE issued $38.4 billion of dollar debt this year, a 54% increase from 2023, according to the news agency.

In Abu Dhabi, ADNOC’s new XRG investment firm announced today that it has completed the formation of its joint venture with BP on an international natural gas platform called Arcius Energy. The JV, which will initially operate in Egypt, is 51% owned by BP and 49% by XRG.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund concluded its yearlong quest to buy a chunk of London’s Heathrow Airport, joining an ownership group that includes the sovereign wealth funds of Qatar and Singapore.

The PIF will own a 15% stake in FGP TopCo, the holding company that controls Europe’s busiest airport, after the deal was finalized on Thursday. The Saudi fund bought into Heathrow at the same time that Paris-based private equity firm Ardian acquired a 22.6% stake in the airport, which has a market value of about 8.7 billion pounds, or  $11 billion.

“Heathrow acts as a crucial gateway to the world, and we look forward to supporting Heathrow’s management in its efforts to secure the sustainable growth of the airport and to continue to maintain its position as a global aviation hub,” Turqi Al-Nowaiser, PIF Deputy Governor and Head of International Investments, said in a statement.

The Saudi fund, which manages some $930 billion in assets, has acquired a range of holdings in the U.K. that includes the Newcastle United football club and large stakes in Selfridges department store and the Rocco Forte luxury hotel group.

Among Heathrow’s owners are the Qatar Investment Authority, which holds a 20% interest, Singapore’s GIC sovereign fund and the Australian Retirement Trust.

The new chief of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund plans to shake things up in Doha.
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CEO Mohammed Al-Sowaidi tells the Financial Times that the Qatar Investment Authority will deploy funds more “aggressively” and “do bigger-ticket deals,” counting on a projected windfall from gas prices that could ultimately double the fund’s size.

Sowaidi said he was bullish on the U.S., the U.K. and Asia, with plans to focus on technology, artificial intelligence, healthcare, real estate and infrastructure.

Al-Sowaidi was the QIA’s chief of investment in the Americas before he was appointed CEO last month.

Saudi Arabia has 10 years to prepare for its stint as the epicenter of global sports when the kingdom hosts soccer’s 2034 World Cup.

Gathered in an online meeting on Wednesday convened by governing body FIFA, representatives of 200 national soccer federations gave their approval to Saudi Arabia, which was uncontested in its bid for hosting the world’s most-watched sporting event, the Associated Press reports.

“We look forward to hosting an exceptional and unprecedented edition of the FIFA World Cup by harnessing our strengths and capabilities to bring joy to football fans around the world,” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in a statement.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund plans to spend tens of billions of dollars on projects related to the World Cup, including one of the stadiums built 350 meters above the ground in NEOM. Another stadium named for the Crown Prince will be atop a cliff in Riyadh’s Qiddiya sports and entertainment development.

Much like Qatar’s experience hosting the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, Saudi Arabia will be subject to intense scrutiny of its human rights record, including the treatment of women and migrant workers.

LIV Golf, the upstart league backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, is generating renewed buzz in its two-year dance with the PGA tour.

The sovereign wealth fund is nearing a deal to acquire a stake of about 6% in PGA Tour Enterprises, which would value the U.S.-based golf league’s commercial arm at $12 billion, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources familiar with the negotiations.

The PIF started LIV Golf in 2022 as a rival to the PGA Tour, setting off court battles after the new league lured away star golfers for contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

The two organizations agreed to a merger deal in 2023, but have since been unable to agree on the terms.

LIV is also considering a possible merger with Europe’s DP World Tour, Bloomberg reported last month.

The two golf leagues already have a strategic alliance on prize money growth and some reciprocal memberships.

Talabat Holding, which staged the Gulf’s largest IPO of the year, made its trading debut on the Dubai Financial Market stock exchange with a 6.9% drop in its shares.|

The MENA delivery service’s decline on Tuesday was followed with a 12% plunge by its parent company Delivery Hero in Frankfurt.

Talabat raised $2 billion last week in the initial sale of a 20% stake in the popular motorcycle-driven food delivery company.

The Gulf has been one of the busiest regions for IPOs in 2024, with recent share sales by Saudi Arabia’s United International Holding Co., UAE-based Lulu Retail Holdings and Oman’s OQ Exploration & Production.