Dubai Business Environment
Dubai Business Environment
Entrepreneurs everywhere today are looking for the most favourable business environment to found or further their economic ventures. For those eager investors, Dubai is perhaps the most welcoming place on Earth, providing an open economy and excellent incentives to ensure prosperity and growth. A richly diverse economy complemented by the oil-rich environment and high-end infrastructure provides entrepreneurs the perfect ambience for setting-up business in Dubai.
The Dubai economy has kept its growth pace despite the current global financial situation. Surpassing its own record six times within the past 25 years, Dubai’s economy has recorded the United Arab Emirates as the fourth largest financial hub in the region. Over the past few years, Dubai has seeing quite a range of industries such as oil and gas, real estate, engineering and manufacturing contribute heavily to the entire nation’s GDP. The incentives offered to foreign investors are partly the reason for this. Who can say no to the wonderful advantages and simple business processes in place in Dubai?
During the past 10 years, Dubai has been the primary contributor towards taking the country’s investment market from approximately $2 billion to over $5 billion. The incentives offered to foreign investors are mostly the reasons for such a huge growth in the economy, because many Western and European entrepreneurs have invested their dollars and euros in Dubai businesses. Expatriate investors are provided with non-existent foreign exchange controls as well as 100% capital and profits repatriation. These are in addition to the simple fact that Dubai is a tax-free economy and has no corporate or personal income taxes.
Local and GCC regional investors have more flexibility than investors from other nationalities, but the general gist of Dubai’s business processes is simplicity itself – all foreign investors are welcome to establish main offices and branches in Dubai.
To speak of Dubai business without mentioning its free zones is to overlook an important factor in the fast-developing economy. There are existing and upcoming free zones all over Dubai and the number of these are close to twenty. Free zones allow 100% business ownership by a foreign investor, unlike in other areas of Dubai. The estimated profits made via free zone activities are approximately US$15 billion per year.
