Dubai Holding unit's profit surges

Dubai - Group aims annual profit of Dh10b in 4 years, 2015 revenue jumps 15%

Dubai Holding Commercial Operations Group said on Saturday its 2015 net profit grew 25 per cent to Dh5.83 billion and revenues increased by 15 per cent to Dh5.83 billion.
The developer of the Mall of World aims to achieve annual profit of Dh10 billion in four years. The mega project is expected to be completed by 2020 that will house hundreds of buildings, 20,000 hotel rooms, and the largest indoor theme park in the world.
Dubai Holding operates in 24 countries through three leading business units. Other than Tecom, it also owns Jumeirah Group, a global luxury hotel company; and Dubai Properties Group, one of the largest fully integrated real estate and community development businesses.
The group stated that its 2015 growth was supported by the strong performance of its business units: Tecom Group, Jumeirah Group and Dubai Properties Group.
Mohammad Abdulla Al Gergawi, chairman of Dubai Holding, explained that the group's solid performance supported the development of Dubai's diversified economy. Dubai Holding continued to champion a range of non-oil sectors including; hospitality, leisure, property, innovation, knowledge and technology. These sectors helped underpin the development of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), a sector vital to sustainable economic development.
Mohammad Abdulla Al Gergawi, added: "Dubai Holding continues to make big strides in its successful strategy aimed at creating an innovation driven knowledge-based economy. This is in line with Dubai's long-term ambition to transform into the smartest and most productive city in the world."
Tecom Group, which manages business communities in multiple sectors, continues to play an important role in developing Dubai's non-oil sector and is central to the Emirate's strategy of becoming the smartest city in the world.
The number of registered companies at Tecom Group's business parks has increased by 11 per cent crossing 5,100 companies with more than 76,000 creative workers by end of 2015.
Jumeirah Group performed well during 2015 with robust occupancy levels across its 23 hotels in Europe, the Middle East and Asia that the company operated during that year. Jumeirah continues to be recognised as one of the world's leading hotel chains, receiving 75 international awards in 2015.
Jumeirah is committed to continuing its global expansion with the opening of the 'Jumeirah Bodrum Palace' in Turkey. It has also signed four management agreements for hotels in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Malaysia, and is progressing well with the 'Madinat Jumeirah' expansion project. Other milestones achieved by Jumeirah last year include a partnership with technology giant Google to launch 'Jumeirah Inside', an industry-first digital platform that offers guests a virtual reality tour of some of its hotels. 
During the year, Dubai Properties Group (DPG) signed an agreement with the Roads and Transport Authority, in which the latter would develop roads to the 'Arjan', 'Majan' and 'Liwan' developments. DPG also signed an agreement in 2015 in which Dubai Electricity and Water Authority would build six substations worth Dh700 million to generate power for DPG developments.
During 2015, DPG launched three new real estate projects and successfully handed over more than 800 residential units and the Company's residential leasing portfolio of over 15,000 units continued to perform extremely well with occupancy at 98 per cent, and staff accommodation units occupied at full capacity of 100 per cent. Average occupancy for retail units is at 83 per cent, and is at a 100 per cent for commercial units.
- abdulbasit@khaleejtimes.com