Entrepreneurs in the UAE’s villages could soon face fewer hurdles when starting and scaling their ventures, under plans reviewed by the country’s top entrepreneurship body to widen the reach of a mobile support program.
The “Mobile Accelerators in Villages” initiative, discussed at a recent meeting of the UAE Council for Entrepreneurship, is designed to bring business services closer to founders working outside the country’s main commercial hubs. Council members weighed ways to broaden the program and tackle everyday problems that hold entrepreneurs back, from access to funding to finding somewhere to trade. Among the proposed forms of assistance are streamlined licensing, help securing premises and capital, access to incubation, and links to sales channels and buyers.
Those discussions unfolded against a backdrop of rapid expansion in the sector. Active SME licences across the UAE have grown by upwards of 140% since 2020, and by more than 900% when measured against figures from 2000, a surge that tracks with a national drive to build up entrepreneurship. Small and medium-sized firms now make up roughly 95% of all companies in the country and provide more than 85% of jobs in the private sector, according to recent Ministry of Economy and Tourism data.
The meeting was chaired by Abdulla bin Touq Al Marri, Minister of Economy and Tourism, and took stock of national programs aimed at making the SME landscape more competitive and durable over the long run. Bin Touq described entrepreneurship and small business as central to the UAE’s economic planning, calling them essential to growth, diversification, and the shift toward an innovation-driven, knowledge-based economy. Government policy, he said, had produced a connected framework of programs and incentives built around what founders actually need to expand.
Much of the session focused on outcomes from “The Emirates: The Startup Capital of the World,” a campaign that His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister, and Ruler of Dubai, launched in September 2025. Bin Touq pointed to the campaign’s results as evidence that the country’s approach was reinforcing its appeal to founders and startups worldwide.
The campaign’s tally was substantial. It trained and qualified over 400 Emirati men and women, while 214 citizens went through the Riyada program, which logged a 97% satisfaction rate. Forty-one government initiatives were rolled out across nine areas, carried out with 10 partner organizations in five emirates. Government procurement tied to the campaign totaled AED 202 million, comprising AED 78.6 million from 55 contracts with seven government bodies and a further AED 123.4 million at the federal level. A further 405 businesses joined the suppliers’ registry.
Beyond procurement, the campaign delivered incubation to 30 real estate firms, registered 46 tax agents, licensed 40 project management specialists, assisted 49 people through the Emirati Families Program, and supported 100 student projects.
Councillors also turned to closer collaboration between federal and local government on a national entrepreneurship strategy. As envisioned, the strategy would carry programs meant to sharpen the ecosystem’s competitiveness, sustain SME growth, and ease the conditions for doing business, with attention paid to governance, monitoring, and how the impact of each initiative would be gauged after launch.
Separately, the council examined recommendations developed with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development for bringing UAE entrepreneurship and SME policy into alignment. Those recommendations rest on four pillars: financing, innovation, internationalization, and measurement, together with continued work on the legal and regulatory framework. Members debated how to rank the recommendations, how to split implementation duties between federal and local authorities, and how to shape a roadmap for what comes next.
On the international front, the UAE has kept a strong position, topping the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2025/2026 report for the fifth year running and coming in second worldwide for entrepreneurial finance and for how readily that finance can be accessed.
