By Ruoxin Lei, SFC, 21st Century Business Herald

Over the past five years, the total non-oil trade between Dubai and China has grown steadily. In 2024, bilateral non-oil trade increased by 19% year-on-year, exceeding $80 billion and accounting for 89% of the UAE’s total non-oil trade with China. By 2030, bilateral trade between the UAE and China is projected to reach $200 billion.

In 2023, the Vice President and the Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai unveiled the Dubai Economic Agenda (D33), aiming to double the size of Dubai’s economy over the next decade and position Dubai as one of the world’s fastest-growing, safest, and best-connected cities. With the alignment of the Belt and Road Initiative and Dubai’s development vision, an increasing number of Chinese companies are choosing Dubai as their regional headquarters. As of the end of November 2025, the number of active Chinese member companies registered with Dubai Chambers has grown by 209% compared to 2015.

Recently,  21st Century Business Herald interviewed H.E. Mohammad Ali Rashed Lootah, President & CEO of Dubai Chambers, focusing on the development needs, specific industry landscapes, and convergence points between Dubai and Shenzhen. The discussion delved into how Dubai and Shenzhen can mutually benefit and achieve win-win outcomes, providing a clear roadmap of opportunities for businesses and markets in both regions.

H.E. Lootah noted that Shenzhen, as China’s innovation engine and “top foreign trade city,” and Dubai, as an international hub in the Middle East, have closely aligned development strategies across multiple areas.

Shenzhen boasts significant strengths in future industries such as the digital economy and artificial intelligence, which are also key strategic priorities for Dubai. He emphasized that establishing an “innovation corridor” between Dubai and Shenzhen is crucial, as it will help businesses from both cities gain better access to talent and markets, and foster growth.

Amid the current wave of Chinese companies expanding overseas, Dubai is also seeking support from enterprises in fields such as AI, hard tech, fintech, and logistics technology to help achieve the goals set out in its D33 agenda.

Establishing an "Innovation Corridor" with Shenzhen is Crucial

21st Century Business Herald:  You’ve been to Shenzhen before. What attracted the Dubai Chambers here, and what are your top priorities for this visit?

H.E. Lootah: Shenzhen is one of the main cities in China. It's well known globally as an economic powerhouse, specifically in the sectors of the future: digital economy, AI and other related sectors that are considered strategic sectors for Dubai. Dubai has very high ambitions to grow the digital economy and to increase the contribution coming from digital economy and the GDP of the city.

So in addition to the strength of Shenzhen and the tech sector, Shenzhen plays an important role in the exports in China, especially the value of exports leaving one city from China, Shenzhen is considered one of the top cities. Due to the nature of Dubai as a global trade hub. We believe that creating a synergy and further cooperation with Shenzhen will help increasing the bilateral trade between the two cities.

21st Century Business Herald: Dubai is widely seen as the commercial and financial hub of the Middle East, while Shenzhen is China's powerhouse for technology and innovation. What traits, or shared spirit, do you think the two cities have in common?

H.E. Lootah: In addition to what I just mentioned about the digital economy both cities have a strategic geographical location. Shenzhen is having very active ports and excellent connectivity. When it comes to here, Dubai has the same.

In addition to that, we notice that Shenzhen is very cosmopolitan, where the English language being quite widely spread, which is helpful when it comes to international trade. And Dubai is a cosmopolitan city, having more than 190 nationalities living there.

We are very pleased to have more than 300,000 Chinese having Dubai as a home. Majority of them owning businesses in Dubai. Not only large businesses, even small and medium businesses that either start from China and expanded globally in Dubai, or entrepreneurs in China who started their firms from scratch from Dubai. This closeness when it comes to the business committee is very essential.

At the end of the day, we're here to help creating economic prosperity and jobs and opportunities for entrepreneurs and people in both cities.

21st Century Business Herald: Looking ahead, where does the future roadmap for both cities converge? And how can this common ground be turned into strategic cooperation？

H.E. Lootah:  You mentioned earlier that Shenzhen is considered the main city for innovation in China. We believe that creating an innovation corridor between Dubai and Shenzhen is an essential, to make sure that we have the right path for both companies from Dubai and China in terms of accessing talent and accessing market and being able to grow.

We notice now, globally, the world is giving more attention to unicorns. Unicorns always would like to have access to talent, capital and market. And I think due to the strategic location, Shenzhen have excellent technology universities and research centers. This will definitely help both cities. Creating synergies and innovation, and enabling innovators and entrepreneurs to take the growth of their companies to the next level.

Focus on Deep Technology, Fintech, E-commerce, and Logistics Technology

21st Century Business Herald: Currently, over 6000 Chinese companies have already expanded into Dubai. According to your observation, what are the newest and fastest-growing sectors attracting them？

H.E. Lootah: The sectors that plays always an important role in the economy of Dubai, especially when it comes to wholesale and retail, logistics, financial services, will always be attractive to Chinese companies. But what we noticed in the last few years that there is high interest in the technology sectors. We recently saw an excellent entry from Meituan Keeta, in the food aggregation technology sector in Dubai. We witnessed even further growth of companies especially in the deep tech and AI.

I think this is very important to have the a diverse market strategy and have a diverse new entrant to the market for coming innovations into the regions that are not only lifted to Dubai. Dubai and wider region, such as Middle East, North Africa, and Sub Saharan Africa, would definitely have Chinese entrepreneurs tap into markets of fast growth. This will help us to create synergies with Chinese innovators to localize the products, to create more value that will create benefit for the ecosystem of digital economy in Dubai.

21st Century Business Herald: Many Shenzhen companies are eager to expand globally. What specific industries, types of company, or technologies are the ones Dubai is most keen to attract? And what substantial support can Dubai provide？

H.E. Lootah: I'll start with AI. AI is of high importance in both the United Arab Emirates (the country) and Dubai specifically. We always use AI as the leverage for growth, to be able to maximize the economic output and productivity. Deep tech is important.

Fin tech is significantly important. Dubai is aim for rank number four globally. When it comes to fin tech, we witnessed a double digit growth in terms of fin tech companies setting up the city of Dubai.

E-commerce will always continue to grow for two reasons: the strength of the technology sector in the city and the higher adoption of internet users, in addition to the strength of the traditional financial services sector which is a backbone for the fin tech sector.

So these are the three sectors that will definitely be of higher importance. The last but not least sector is the logistic tech. This is particularly significant because we are building in Dubai the largest international airport, Dubai Al-Maktoum International Airport, which is expected to host more than 260 million passengers in the next few years. I think the logistic tech sector will be a vital role in terms of creating a seamless experience for passengers and cargo companies in the city.

Bilateral Investment to Drive Higher-Volume Trade Exchanges

21st Century Business Herald: While we see many Chinese companies heading to Dubai, is Dubai also planning to step up investment or business footprint in China, especially here in Shenzhen?

H.E. Lootah: We have three offices in China as Dubai chambers. One of the three offices is strategically located in Shenzhen here. We always support the bilateral investment. We believe that bilateral investment will yield into higher numbers of trade exchange. It is a very important matter for us. And we have targets to help Dubai based companies to go global. An important part of it is to invest globally. So I believe that working closely with stakeholders from both public and private sector in China will definitely help us to understand what are the investment opportunities available here. And then promote such investment opportunities to companies that are being part of Dubai chambers and based in Dubai.

We are organizing Dubai business Forum. It is our flagship event in Shenzhen here. This is the second time to be organized in China. The first edition was very successful in Beijing, which was attended by more than 800 c-suite level executives from Chinese companies. This event will be an excellent platform for Shenzhen companies and the Greater Bay Area companies to understand more about Dubai and to help them to expand globally. So we invite them to attend the event that will take place in Shangri la Futian here in Shenzhen. And this will be a very strong platform for them to exchange, cooperate and create future ventures.

21st Century Business Herald: Is there anything you'd like to say to businesses or investors here through our camera？

H.E. Lootah: For ones who did not visit Dubai, you are always welcomed to come and experience the city.We have a lot of globally known exhibitions such as GITEX, which is one of the largest tech shows in the world. We have Expand North Star, which is the largest tech startup global event and exhibition. We have other exhibitions and sectors such as food and construction. In addition to that, for the ones who are keen to explore opportunities in Dubai, I advise them to reach out to our office in Shenzhen to be able to have the interaction with them and understand more.

And they are comfortable not only to set up in Dubai, but to have Dubai as a one of their growth pillar in the international plan. 

Chief Producer: Zhao Haijian

Supervising Producer: Shi Shi

Editor: Li Yinong

Reporter: Lei Ruoxin

Camera Operator: Xiao Hang

Video Editor: Li Qun

Poster Design: Wu Huaikuan 

New Media Coordination: Ding Qingyun, Zeng Tingfang, Lai Xi, Huang Daxun

Overseas Operations Supervising Producer: Huang Yanshu

Overseas Content Coordinator: Huang Zihao

Overseas Operations Editors: Zhuang Huan, Wu Wanjie, Long Lihua, Zheng Quanyi 

Media Produced by: Southern Finance Media Corp.