Good morning, friends. The dominant theme in today’s issue: everyone’s building outward. Gems is delivering 5k new school seats this month and lining up 20k more over the next three years — construction delays and all — just as it expands globally through its school management arm, Gems School Management.
Worth sitting with, though: Varkey’s line on Gems’ cost base is a more honest read on where things stand than most of what we hear from executives about the conflict’s economic impact — costs are up and timelines have slipped, but the good news is that changes like these are mostly priced in. We have everything on Gems’ expansion plans and Varkey’s read on demand in the UAE post-conflict in the news well below.
PLUS- Parkin is likely heading to Bahrain, Adnoc Drilling is eyeing Egypt, and Masdar has switched on a battery plant in Rochdale. Also, Fasset just joined the UAE’s unicorn club.
The EnterpriseAM Egypt Forum is back — and we’re devoting the full day to the singular set of questions on everyone’s mind: What does AI actually mean for your company, your people, your economy, your own job — and your kids’ future?
Every session on stage answers one question: “So, what do I actually do about it?”
Join us on 5 October in Cairo. Seats are limited and attendance is by invitation only.
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The Hormuz workaround’s newest investor?
TotalEnergies is putting its own capital behind the UAE’s Hormuz bypass. The French energy giant is set to invest in expanding Abu Dhabi’s export pipeline capacity through Fujairah, as the UAE works to roughly double the amount of crude it can move to the Gulf of Oman without crossing Hormuz, Reuters cites TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanne as saying at a Norwegian energy conference on Monday.
What we know: The existing Habshan-Fujairah pipeline can currently carry up to 1.8 mn bbl / d. Adnoc is currently accelerating work on a second pipeline to Fujairah that it says was already 50% complete in May, targeting its delivery in 2027. The additional line would add around 1.5 mn bbl / d, lifting the UAE’s bypass capacity to roughly 3.3 mn bbl / d. It’s not clear if TotalEnergies would invest in the new pipeline or a different expansion.
Watts to come
Abu Dhabi is planning to double its installed power capacity — from 25 GW today to 50 GW by 2050 — as population growth, economic expansion, and AI-driven data-center demand reshape the emirate’s energy math, Abu Dhabi Department of Energy Director General for Regulatory Affairs Abdulaziz Alobaidli told The National. The forecast tracks IEA projections, and more than AED 300 bn is earmarked for generation, transmission, and distribution to get there.
Renewables will carry most of that growth: Their share of the generation mix is set to rise from 45% to 60% within five years — a steep climb for a grid built on gas, and one that puts Abu Dhabi’s clean-energy timeline ahead of where most Gulf peers are today.
PSAs
#1- Two sports announcements this week are giving us hope that the region’s event calendar is filling back up again. F1 confirmed over the weekend that its season will end exactly where it was always supposed to — Yas Marina on 6 December, with Qatar the week before on 29 November — after March’s cancellations in Bahrain and Saudi left the back half of the calendar looking distinctly wobbly. “The calendar is confirmed, and we stay focused on delivering the calendar we promised at the beginning of the year,” Formula 1 CEO Stefano Domenicali said. Abu Dhabi is down to limited ticket availability, with an entertainment lineup that includes Andrea Bocelli, Lewis Capaldi, Zara Larsson, and Imagine Dragons.
Separately, Abu Dhabi will host the league’s inaugural Basketball SuperCup on 18-19 September at Etihad Arena, bringing Olympiacos, Fenerbahce, Real Madrid, and Dubai Basketball together for the four-team season opener, state news agency Wam reports. That’s just months after the NBA shelved preseason games in Abu Dhabi and Doha over the regional conflict, though the league said at the time games would return to the UAE eventually.
#2- Emirates is gradually restoring Gulf services after weeks of disruption — though at reduced capacity. The airline has resumed one daily Dubai-Kuwait flight, down from four previously, and one daily Bahrain service, down from three, The National reports. The carrier extended select cancellations to both destinations in July as regional hostilities disrupted Gulf air travel.
Still flying high: The reduced Gulf schedule hasn’t knocked Emirates off the top spot globally. The carrier ranked first for international capacity in August with more than 31.1 bn available seat kilometers, around 21% ahead of Ryanair, even as capacity fell 5.4% y-o-y amid regional disruption, according to OAG data.
WEATHER- The mercury is rising to 44°C in Abu Dhabi and 43°C in Dubai today, with the capital seeing a low of 32°C and Dubai seeing a low of 34°C, according to our favorite weather app.
Destination Sahel Issue IV, the final issue in the series, drops this week, and we’re exploring how Egypt’s North Coast could become more than a summer story.
Living in Sahel year-round is moving from a seasonal idea to a serious question; an industrial push is reshaping the Coast’s economic base, and Egyptian homebuyers are weighing Sahel against Dubai, London, and other Mediterranean markets for where to put their money.
In this issue, we get into what it would take for Sahel to work beyond the summer, how industry fits into the Coast’s next chapter, and the numbers behind the Sahel-vs-everywhere debate.
Click here to subscribe to the Egypt edition, coming straight to your inbox tomorrow.
The big story abroad
Washington has announced its latest attempt to squeeze Iran’s economy. Operation Economic Outcast includes sanctioning more than 60 entities, individuals, and vessels on a global level. Secondary sanctions may target entities doing business with Iran across several sectors, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said, warning Tehran’s trade partners to sever ties or face being expelled from the USD-based financial system.
Iran’s response? Tehran threatened military action and further cuts to Gulf oil exports before the US sanctions announcement, but Economy Minister Ali Madanizadeh later said the country was “fully prepared.” An IRGC spokesperson warned Iran would strike US vital interests and energy chokepoints if its infrastructure is threatened.
Washington’s ire toward Ottawa is also making waves, as US President Donald Trump threatened to raise tariffs on Canadian cars to 50% by 1 January and lock existing steel levies at the same rate. Last-minute trade talks collapsed over the weekend, triggering a new wave of US tariffs on USD 20 bn worth of Canadian goods and reigniting a trade war between the two nations.
A hedge fund under the microscope: The US Securities and Exchange Commission subpoenaed major Wall Street banks over trading activity at AI-focused hedge fund Situation Awareness. The fund narrowly avoided collapse after last month’s tech sell-off by selling the majority of its holdings to Citadel — a US hedge fund — in just 24 hours. The regulator will look into the timing of trades between Situation Awareness and its lenders, including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Citigroup, and Bank of America.
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