Dubai developer Emaar turns to ‘big countries’ for M&A opportunities
Company looks to US, India and China after domestic property price boom leaves it with cash to spend and little debt
Dubai’s leading developer Emaar is considering buying companies in countries such as the US, India and China for the first time as it looks to expand internationally using proceeds from a boom in local property values.
Skyrocketing property prices propelled Emaar, whose biggest shareholder is the Investment Corporation of Dubai, to a 25 per cent increase in net profit before tax to Dh18.9bn ($5.1bn) last year. The company posted a 34 per cent gain in the first six months of 2025, spurring it to expand outside its local market.
Emaar’s financial strength meant that “a really serious global strategy is something that the board is really debating now,” said Mohamed Alabbar, its founder and managing director.
“The aim is really to expand drastically,” Alabbar told the Financial Times. “It’s almost like you grow by acquisition.”
Revenues at the owner of the Burj Khalifa skyscraper, the world’s tallest tower, have surged on the back of a third property bull run since Dubai opened up to foreign investors in the early 2000s. Average prices per sq ft in the city have soared 67 per cent between July 2019 and July this year, according to data analytics firm Reidin.
“Emaar is strong in the [United Arab Emirates], but I think maybe UAE is becoming too small for us, or Dubai is becoming too small for us, to continue this growth story,” said Alabbar, who is one of the most influential businessmen in the region.
Alabbar said while Emaar has established and operated foreign subsidiaries in the past, including in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, it was now considering a strategy based on acquisitions, partly because its low level of debt meant it could borrow easily to fund acquisitions.
“How can we smartly and reasonably take equity and leverage and really do something?” he said, adding that “the model of investing in a big local player, I think it’s a better way” than starting its own companies abroad.
Alabbar said that the acquisition plan still needed board approval, but it was his “strong recommendation”.
He said he wanted Emaar to look at “big countries” such as the US, India, China and parts of Europe and was flexible about the exact nature of the relationships once it had identified targets.
“Maybe you go and buy a majority stake in a developer and then change the way they do business . . . [Or] maybe they already do good business [and] we learn from them.”
Emaar already has a sizeable presence overseas, owning more than 175mn sq ft of land outside the UAE at the end of 2024, excluding a 1.1bn sq ft “economic city” project in Saudi Arabia.
Alabbar said Emaar’s current total land bank — an industry term referring to land owned by developers and reserved for future use — was at 1.87bn sq ft, including the UAE.
India, where Emaar owned 122mn sq ft of land at the end of 2024, could provide a testing ground for Emaar’s overseas strategy and its subsidiary there was discussing a potential joint venture with local developers, including the Adani Group, Alabbar said.
Alabbar dismissed reports that Emaar had been discussing the sale of its business in India to Adani. “We’re not selling,” he said. “We actually were looking for local partners to do a local [joint venture].”
Adani did not respond to a request for comment.