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Asia · Country profile

United Arab Emirates

Asia · Pop. 10.9M · #23 startup ecosystem by EV

A public taster of the full United Arab Emirates ecosystem on Dealroom — request a demo for live deal flow, founder pedigrees, AI-talent maps, and the full cap table for every company below.

$79.1B+60%
Combined startup EV
$3.9B
VC invested (last 12mo)
1,553
Tracked startups
1.9
Unicorns per 1M people
🦄 Unicorns
21
21 live · +6 new in 2025 (incl. 1 new decacorns)
💎 Decacorns
1
$10B+ tier
🐎 Thoroughbreds
13
Top 1% growth · $500M+

Adjacent ecosystems by EV

Startup hubs

Inside United Arab Emirates: top 2 startup hubs

Sub-national ecosystems ranked by combined enterprise value of all tracked startups headquartered there.

By enterprise value
1 Dubai-Sharjah-Ajman Metropolitan Area $65.4B
2 Abu Dhabi Region $12.7B
By unicorn count
1 Dubai-Sharjah-Ajman Metropolitan Area 18
2 Abu Dhabi Region 3

Startup funnel

United Arab Emirates's power-law funnel

From every VC-backed startup down to the biggest scale-ups. Conversion rates show what fraction of one tier graduate into the next. Capital figures (where shown) are total VC deployed at that stage.

VC-backed startups
1,541
Colts ($25M+ revenue) $401.9M deployed
25
1.6% of prior tier
Unicorns ($1B+ valuation) $2.6B deployed
20
80% of prior tier
Decacorns ($10B+ valuation)
1
5.0% of prior tier

Enterprise value · 2015–2025

United Arab Emirates grew 31.7× since 2015

Combined enterprise value of every tracked startup headquartered in United Arab Emirates that's still operating today, totalled by founding-year cohort.

0 $20B $40B $60B $80B United Arab Emirates · $77.7B 2015 2018 2021 2024 2025

Vs. similarly-sized ecosystems

How United Arab Emirates stacks up

Peers chosen from the same Asia cluster within ±70% of United Arab Emirates's combined EV. The scatter plots growth × current size for the wider continent — outliers in the upper-right are ecosystems compounding fastest.

Combined enterprise value
$255.3B
$185.6B
United Arab Emirates
$79.1B
$64.8B
$59.4B
$55.7B
$34.3B
$33.6B
EV growth (5-yr ×) vs current EV
peer median 9.0× 3.2× 172.9× 342.6× $12.3B $267B $5.8T EV growth (5yr ×) Combined enterprise value (log) China India Israel South Korea Singapore Japan Hong Kong United Arab Emirates Indonesia Taiwan Türkiye Vietnam Saudi Arabia

Top overview

Asia ecosystems — combined view

Top ecosystems in Asia ranked by combined EV. United Arab Emirates's row is highlighted.

# Ecosystem Combined EV 5-yr EV growth Unicorns VC invested Tracked startups
1 China $5.8T 3.2× 479 $33.4B 24.5K
2 India $883.7B 7.1× 125 $13.9B 13.3K
3 Israel $599.9B 5.6× 128 $10.7B 4,762
4 South Korea $438.6B 15.6× 41 $8.2B 7,931
5 Singapore $359.5B 9.6× 38 $3.3B 3,900
6 Japan $255.3B 6.4× 19 $4.3B 7,794
7 Hong Kong $185.6B 13.0× 21 $3.6B 1,222
8 United Arab Emirates $79.1B 10.6× 21 $3.9B 1,553
9 Indonesia $64.8B 5.0× 12 $485.3M 1,208
10 Taiwan $59.4B 7.9× 5 $209.1M 621
11 Türkiye $55.7B 20.7× 8 $714.3M 2,031
12 Vietnam $34.3B 15.3× 4 $461.5M 616

Patent intelligence

United Arab Emirates startup IP portfolio: 890 patent families

Granted patent families assigned to startups headquartered in United Arab Emirates. Aggregated across the country's hub-level filings — Bay Area, Boston, etc. roll up under the United States row, the same way Tokyo and Osaka roll up under Japan.

Granted patent families
890
Filed by tracked startups headquartered in the country.
81.8 patents per million residents · #37 globally
Top patenting hubs
1 Abu Dhabi 751
2 Dubai 139

Premium analytics

What we don't show on this page (yet)

Sector breakdowns, founder origins, AI-talent leaderboards and live deal flow are gated to logged-in Dealroom users. Book a demo to access the full United Arab Emirates dataset — or see a sample on the Dealroom app.

Sector breakdown
Where United Arab Emirates's unicorns concentrate
Fintech
AI / Enterprise SW
Health Tech
Biotech
Cybersecurity
Consumer
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Founder origins
Where United Arab Emirates's startup founders come from
By country of origin
Per capita
Top universities
Top alumni-factory companies
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AI talent
Top employers of AI talent in United Arab Emirates
Core AI roles
Frontier AI roles
YoY hiring growth
Senior + lead engineers
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Deal flow
Live deal flow & funding rounds in United Arab Emirates
New rounds last 30 days
Stage breakdown
Active investors
Round-size trends
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