Analysis Tourism Kuwait Entertainment City targets Gulf tourism rivals Kuwait Investment Authority taking over a planned Entertainment City development in the nation’s capital is the latest sign of an upturn in its commercial real estate sector, according to experts. Authorities first announced the nearly $660 million (KWD 200 million) project in October 2019, then relaunched it in May 2023. A study at the time […] August 27, 2024
Analysis Construction Mena hotel construction to focus on Saudi Arabia and Egypt The Middle East and North Africa is forecast to see a rapid increase in hotel construction over the next 12 months, led in particular by high-end properties in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, new industry data suggests. During the second quarter of 2024 there were 607 projects and 147,088 rooms in the overall regional pipeline at […] August 27, 2024
Construction Belgian company wins $220m Palm Jebel Ali dredging contract The AED 810 million ($220 million) contract to complete dredging, land reclamation, beach profiling and other work at Palm Jebel Ali has been awarded to a subsidiary of the Belgian-owned Jan De Nul Group. In May the Dubai state-owned developer Nakheel announced that local contractor DBB Contracting and Khansaheb Civil Engineering, a subsidiary of Khansaheb […] August 26, 2024
Construction Saudi builders fined for anti-competitive practices A Saudi regulatory authority has imposed more than SAR6.5 million ($1.7 million) worth of fines on 14 construction firms for anti-competitive practices. They were found to have colluded in setting prices when bidding for government projects, highlighting ongoing problems in the sector. The firms violated Saudi rules protecting fair access to public contracts, according to […] August 23, 2024
Analysis Real Estate Back-to-school season to kick off Dubai’s busy real estate market Expatriate families moving to Dubai for the start of the school year traditionally spur an increase in real estate transactions, while predictions of US interest rate cuts herald a lively property market in the emirate for the second half of 2024. More than 326,000 foreign and emirati students are slated to head back to Dubai […] August 23, 2024
Real Estate Artificial lagoons making waves in Dubai Creating water features in the desert is expensive and ambitious, but they draw premium prices from residents seeking relief from the heat August 21, 2024
Analysis Logistics Cold storage in hot demand across the Gulf Demand for chilled and frozen foods is rising across the Gulf, driving growth in the region’s cold chain infrastructure. Maersk, the Danish logistics company, says this demand – along with food security concerns – motivated it to open its first UAE cold store at Dubai Industrial City last summer. Population growth and concerns around climate […] August 14, 2024
Analysis Leisure & Hospitality Recruitment a sticking point for Gulf hospitality The tourism industry is expected to support the creation of thousands of jobs in the UAE and wider GCC this year, yet hospitality firms might struggle to fill many of these vacancies. Heightened competition, the physical and emotional intensity of the work, and more flexible professional alternatives are among the factors luring prospective staff in […] August 2, 2024
Analysis Construction Saudi real estate hiring drops amid giga-project review Saudi Arabia’s review of its many giga-projects dented real estate hiring in the country in the second quarter of this year, driving a larger decline across the GCC. The drop, revealed by Cooper Fitch’s latest Gulf Employment Index which tracks new hires, mirrors a broader slowdown in the Saudi property and construction markets. However, it […] August 2, 2024
Analysis Real Estate Supply shortage looms large in outlook for Dubai property The Dubai residential real estate market remains one of the world’s best performers, but a shortage of supply is having an increasingly big impact on rents and sale prices. This is the picture that emerges from three real estate consultancies’ reports on the emirate’s market in the first six months of 2024. Dubai had the […] August 1, 2024
Leisure & Hospitality Lottery licence heralds UAE gaming industry growth The issuance of the UAE’s first lottery licence and publication of a framework to regulate gaming looks set to kickstart the rapid development of the industry in the Gulf nation. The year-old federal General Commercial Gaming Regulatory Authority (GCGRA) said over the weekend it had awarded Abu Dhabi-based The Game LLC the rights to operate […] July 30, 2024
Real Estate Aldar reports strong half-year performance Strong interest from international buyers, an increasingly tight office sector and a record development backlog at the end of June helped Aldar Properties to double-digit profit and revenue growth for the first half of 2024. Profit rose 57 percent year on year to AED3.3 billion, while revenue surged 73 percent to almost AED11 billion, the […] July 29, 2024
Construction Drake & Scull announces positive note after return to markets Construction company Drake & Scull International has reported mid-year net profit of AED 30 million ($8.17 million) two months after it resumed trading on the Dubai Financial Market following a scandal-plagued, six-year suspension. Engineer and chairman of the board of directors Shafiq Abdelhamid said in a statement that he was “pleased” with Drake & Scull […] July 29, 2024
Analysis Construction Supply logjams force Gulf builders to get creative Shipping cost spikes resulting from the Red Sea crisis are hitting the Gulf’s construction industry especially hard. Mounting tensions between Israel and the Houthis in Yemen are exacerbating the already severe decline in commercial shipping traffic there. Builders are struggling to adjust their supply chains and pricing mechanisms to deliver materials and products to their […] July 29, 2024
Analysis Aviation Dubai and Jeddah dominate airport construction in Mena Just two giant projects, in Dubai and Jeddah, account for almost 80 percent of current spending on airport development in the Middle East and North Africa, a report has revealed. Some 19 different projects, ranging from expansions to additional runways and entire new airports, are under way in 11 countries across the region, according to […] July 25, 2024
Real Estate Large deals drive Qatar and Kuwait real estate in Q2 Large one-off transactions masked an otherwise sluggish performance in the Qatari and Kuwaiti real estate markets in the second quarter of this year. The number of mortgage transactions in Qatar from April to June increased by more than 42 percent over the same period last year. Some 376 deals were signed for a total value […] July 24, 2024
Video length: 08:13 Analysis Logistics Logistics giants compete for space in Saudi Arabia Global logistics companies are flocking to Saudi Arabia as the country’s socio-economic transformation drives demand for industrial and ecommerce buildings. Last week DB Schenker, the logistics subsidiary of Germany’s rail operator Deutsche Bahn, signed a deal with Riyadh-based developer Kaden to construct warehouses in the kingdom. At the end of May construction work started on […] July 24, 2024
Transport UAE company in joint venture to build Baghdad metro A Malaysian engineering company and its UAE affiliate have jointly won a $316 million contract to oversee the construction of the new Baghdad metro. The building of the planned 148-kilometre network and its 64 stations across the Iraqi capital was slated to begin this month and end in 2029. This timeline might be delayed, however, […] July 19, 2024
Real Estate Dar Global to build new Trump tower in Dubai The Trump real estate brand got another boost in the Gulf on Thursday as developer Dar Global announced it would build a Trump Tower in Dubai. The London-listed overseas arm of Saudi Arabia’s largest developer Dar Al Arkan said further details about the agreement with the Trump Organization, such as the exact location and construction […] July 18, 2024
Video length: 08:13 Analysis Tourism Event tourism the spur for economic growth in Bahrain Bahrain has affirmed the strategic importance of the Sakhir Sports City development in a growing focus on event-related tourism as a primary engine of economic growth. The project, near the country’s Formula 1 circuit, is slated for completion in 2025 and expected to cost more than BD100 million ($266 million). It will encompass a stadium […] July 18, 2024
Construction Eagle Hills gets claws into Indonesia Eagle Hills, the Abu Dhabi developer, looks set to add Indonesia to its burgeoning worldwide portfolio. A tentative agreement was signed on Wednesday with the Indonesian government to develop $3 billion worth of tourism assets in the Southeast Asian archipelago. The deal has a validity of one year only, with the possibility of renewal, and […] July 17, 2024
Analysis Finance Middle East property tech draws venture capital interest Venture capital is pouring into the Middle Eastern property technology industry, buoyed by continued growth in regional real estate. Property tech offerings encompass listing websites, rental management services and investment products, among others. In the first half of 2024 startups in the sector became the number one target for early-stage funding, beating fintech, which has […] July 16, 2024
