Author: Stuart

Ameer Khan spent 17 years at Apex Group before Praxis convinced him to switch sides. On 16 June, the Dubai-based professional services firm announced Khan would lead fund operations across the six GCC states. The hire signals ambition. Khan brings nearly two decades of experience in investor servicing, regulatory compliance and the operational machinery that keeps alternative investment structures running. At Apex, a global financial services firm, he shepherded funds through the full investor lifecycle—onboarding, transaction processing, AML and KYC reviews, regulatory reporting. The unglamorous backbone work that fund managers rely on but rarely celebrate. Praxis has been building that…

By mid-morning on Bluewaters Island, syrniki topped with sour cream mousse are already moving toward terrace tables. Flat whites cool beside plates of avocado and salmon toast. Sunlight bounces off the water, and the first lunch orders haven’t even started yet. This is 45 Bistro, the latest iteration of a homegrown Dubai brand that launched just three years ago. What started in 2023 as a neighbourhood café concept has quietly grown into a two-location operation, and the Bluewaters outpost marks a distinct shift in ambition. Where the original Port de La Mer venue leans toward cosy breakfasts and coffee catch-ups,…

MMG Group opened offices in three European cities on Tuesday, pushing an 18-year-old Dubai operation into markets typically dominated by agencies flowing the opposite direction. The simultaneous launch marks an unusual play. From its Shoreditch base in London, already operational, the company is building out activities in Paris whilst developing its Barcelona presence. All three expansions were confirmed 16 June, representing the most aggressive geographic push since MMG Group launched in Dubai back in 2008. What started as a production house has morphed into something broader. MMG Group now operates two core divisions: MMG Artists, which represents photographers, stylists and…

Salt River Project needs to double its generating capacity by 2035. The Phoenix-area utility signed a 20-year agreement on 15th June with Energy Dome to deploy a 19-megawatt storage system that runs on compressed carbon dioxide—not lithium-ion cells. The project will rise at SRP’s Coronado Generating Station in St. Johns, Arizona, storing enough electricity to power 4,275 homes for 10 hours. Google is funding part of the build through a cost-sharing arrangement, marking the tech giant’s second collaboration with SRP on non-lithium energy storage. It’s an unusual technology. Energy Dome’s CO2 Battery compresses carbon dioxide using grid power, then releases…

When the US-Iran conflict erupted in February 2026, trading spreads on Bitget’s tokenised equity markets widened. Within days, they’d snapped back to normal levels. The speed surprised even the exchange’s own analysts. A report published Monday by Bitget and quantitative research firm Block Scholes examined how digital versions of real-world assets performed during one of 2026’s most volatile geopolitical moments. The findings suggest that tokenised markets—long dismissed as experimental—may have reached a maturity threshold that traditional finance can no longer ignore. By mid-May, the NVDA-USDT perpetual futures contract on Bitget had accumulated approximately $4.1 million in resting liquidity within 2%…

Mornine stood in the venue corridor during a major international sporting event, fielding questions in Arabic, English, and Mandarin within the same five-minute stretch. The humanoid robot—developed by automotive brand OMODA & JAECOO—wasn’t there to sell vehicles. She was there to greet guests, navigate crowds to their seats, and demonstrate what happens when a car manufacturer decides hospitality is the next frontier. The deployment took place in June 2026, though OMODA declined to specify which sporting event hosted the robots. Alongside Mornine came Argos, a four-legged quadruped unit that navigated crowded spaces and avoided obstacles with the kind of autonomy…

Seven tenants signed rental agreements exceeding AED10 million annually between January and May 2026. Another nine contracts landed in the AED5-10 million bracket. The figures, released Sunday by fäm Properties, reveal a rental market where the ultra-wealthy aren’t just choosing Dubai—they’re paying double-digit millions for the privilege. The shift goes beyond eye-watering individual deals. New tenancy contracts above AED1 million jumped 27% in value to AED509 million across the first five months of the year, up from AED400 million in the same period of 2025. Renewed contracts climbed 28% to AED114 million from AED89 million. Transaction volumes held steady. What…

Senior officials from Abu Dhabi gathered at The Peninsula Shanghai on 11th June for a closed-door session that doubled as a vehicle showcase. The Freelander 8 sat in the hotel’s event space, marking the first public appearance of a nameplate that vanished from showrooms years ago. Now it’s back. Sort of. The revived Freelander emerges not from Jaguar Land Rover alone, but from an partnership between the British marque and Chinese manufacturer Chery. JLR handles design. Chery supplies the electric powertrain technology and manages supply chain integration. The result positions itself as what executives call a “British Premium Intelligent All-Terrain…

Two weeks. That’s how long merchants now need to plug into Kwik Payments’ orchestration platform—a process that traditionally consumed months of integration work. The Johannesburg-based payment service provider went live on 11th June with ACI Worldwide’s orchestration technology, targeting conversion uplifts above 20% for merchants across South Africa and wider African markets. For CEO Eddy Marais, the deployment marks the opening salvo in a push to give African retailers the same payment sophistication their European and American counterparts take for granted. “Our ambition is to help shape the future of digital commerce in Africa by giving merchants access to reliable,…

Twelve properties worth more than AED5 million changed hands every day in Dubai last month. By the time May ended, developers had recorded nearly AED5 billion in off-plan sales. The pace underscores the Emirates’ grip on ultra-prime real estate capital. Figures released Thursday by luxury developer Keturah show 391 transactions completed across the month—184 villa deals generating AED2.51 billion, and 207 apartment sales reaching AED2.45 billion. The average property shifted for AED12.7 million. Talal M. Al Gaddah, founder and chief executive of Keturah, framed the volume in global terms. “This is the equivalent of almost 400 homes each worth more…