The UAE has announced that it will be the first and foremost country to have an Arab city which will be involved in manufacturing commercial airplane in a business venture.
The project will be undertaken by its aerospace company Mubadala, which aims to build aircrafts in the UAE by 2018. Mubadala will be working in partnership with the Piaggio Group, Italy, in which Mubadala has a 31.5% stake. Mubadala wants to become the hub of global aerospace business and it is counting on Piaggio to reach there because of the latter’s know-how and experience in the domain.
The investment is such domains is part of the Emirates strategies to ease its dependency on oil revenues by almost half before the year 2030 summarized in a government programme entitled “Abu Dhabi vision 2030.” As of now, 65% of its budget depends on income gained from oil.
The chief executive of Mubadala aerospace company, Homaid El Shemmari, believes the new project will contribute an increase between the ranges of 1 % to 3 % of the gross domestic product by 2030.
He went to estimate that the Middle East ordered almost 15% of the global commercial aircrafts between 2011 and 2030, therefore the market is present and the customers are willing to buy but he made it clear that the biggest markets are within the pacific region. Shemmari concluded by saying that the UAE enjoys a “location on the world map to begin to produce commercial aircraft structures that are able to reach 60 percent of the world’s population within six hours.”
A company called “Strata” has already been put in place by Mubadala to produce aircraft frames. Mubadala is part of a holding group owned by the Abu Dhabi government.
