In a sign of continuing investor confidence in Dubai and new opportunities arising across diverse economic sectors, the Department of Economic Development (DED) in the emirate issued 2,394 new licenses for various professional, commercial, industrial and tourism activities in June 2019. According to the Business Registration and Licensing (BRL) sector in DED 58.5% of the new licences were professional, 38.9% commercial, 1.9% related to tourism and 0.7% industry, and together, they created 7,598 jobs in the labour market.

The ‘Business Map’ digital platform of DED, which seeks to reflect the economic realities in Dubai by providing vital data on each license category including their numbers and distribution on a monthly basis, saw 22,759 business registration and licensing transactions being completed during June 2019. The outsourced service centres of DED accounted for 19,912 transactions – 87% of the total – thus demonstrating their vital role in delivering value-added services to the public in Dubai.

The report showed that License Renewal accounted for 10,417 transactions in June 2019, including 5,335 (51.2%) transactions related to Auto Renewal via text messages.

The June 2019 transactions also showed that Trade Name Reservation accounted for 3,593 transactions, while the number of Initial Approvals reached 2,905. The total number of Commercial Permits reached 906 in June 2019.

BRL also issued 250 instant licenses, which is processed in a single step without the need for either the Memorandum of Association or an existing location for the first year, while the number of DED Trader licenses, which allows to conduct business activities on social media, reached 219 in June 2019.

The report also showed that the top nationalities who secured licenses in June 2019 were: Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Egypt, Britain, China, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, The Philippines and Lebanon in that order.

The Bur Dubai area accounted for for the largest share (1,399) of licences issued in June 2019, followed by Deira (993), and Hatta (2). The top sub-regions, which accounted for 64.8% of all the transactions, were: Al Garhoud (13.4%), Al Barsha 1 (12.2%), Burj Khalifa (10.3%), Al Fahidi (10.1%), Port Saeed (5.3%), Dubai World Trade Centre 1 (3.0%), Oud Metha (3.0%), Umm Al Ramoul (2.8%), Al Marar (2.8%), and Naif (1.9%).

Real estate, leasing & business services accounted for 38.8% of the new licenses issued in June 2019 according to the distribution of economic activities, followed by Trade & repair services (27.1%), Community & personal services (12.6%), Building & Construction (8.3%), Transport, storage & communications (4.5%), Hotels group (3.4%), Manufacturing (2.4%), Financial brokerage (1.5%), Health & labour (0.6%), Education (0.5%), and Agriculture (0.3%).