Abu Dhabi’s International Holding Company is in the process of acquiring an 80 per cent stake in Marlan Holding as it seeks to expand into the space sector.
The acquisition will be carried out through IHC's subsidiary, International Tech Group, subject to regulatory approvals, the company said on Tuesday.
The strategic majority acquisition will expand IHC’s portfolio into deep tech and the new space economy, a statement said.
UAE-based Marlan is the holding company behind Marlan Space, an investor-operator focused on space and space-relevant companies and technology. Its portfolio covers space systems, autonomous operations and advanced computing.
Marlan Space also founded and operates Abu Dhabi-based Orbitworks, a private space infrastructure company and a joint venture with US-based Loft Orbital, to build commercial satellites at scale.
Its programme, Altair, is a multi-sensor, artificial intelligence-enabled Earth observation constellation with multiple satellites and combining optical, hyperspectral, thermal, infrared and passive RF payloads with onboard processing.
Orbitworks designs, builds, tests and operates satellite systems at its plant in Kezad.
“Space is becoming an increasingly important part of the global technology and infrastructure landscape, with applications extending across communications, Earth observation, data, AI and many other sectors," said Syed Basar Shueb, chief executive of IHC.
"This acquisition gives IHC a strategic position in the new space economy and provides Marlan Space with access to the group’s capital, capabilities and dynamic value networks to accelerate its next phase of growth.”
IHC, one of the most valuable holding companies in the Middle East, operates through more than 1,300 subsidiaries.
Its direct units include Alpha Dhabi Holding, EasyLease, Palms Sports, Emirates Stallion Group and Al Seer Marine. Its portfolio companies are Aldar Properties, Al Ain Farms, PureHealth, marine services company NMDC and produce firm NRTC.
Despite the Iran war, the company has not changed its investment strategy and will continue to deploy capital in global markets, Mr Shueb told The National in an interview in May.
IHC planned to invest up to $8 billion over the next six months in sectors including mining, energy and financial services, he said.
The company last month posted a 220 per cent surge in second-quarter profit to Dh12.8 billion ($3.5 billion), boosted by a sharp increase in energy and mining revenue.
Revenue for the quarter rose by more than a third year-on-year to Dh33.4 billion.
IHC's latest acquisition comes amid growth in the global space economy, driven by declining launch costs, growing demand for satellite-enabled data and services, and increasing investment in sovereign space capabilities.
Through Marlan Space, IHC said it will "seek to build on Abu Dhabi’s growing role in advanced technologies while supporting the development of commercially scalable space infrastructure and services with international reach".
The transaction also boosts IHC’s exposure to technology-led sectors, adding to its broader investments across artificial intelligence, digital infrastructure and advanced technologies, it said.
World's 'largest AI infrastructure in space'
On Wednesday, Marlan Space and Loft Orbital said they were leading a consortium in a $1 billion investment in France to build Altair-Next Gen, the "world’s largest artificial intelligence satellite infrastructure". The initial phase comprises 50 satellites carrying radar, optical and other sensors, built to serve the needs of government users, including in France, Europe and the UAE, along with global commercial and sovereign customers, the companies said in a joint statement. The satellites will be produced by Orbitworks at its Kezad facility.
First applications include maritime domain awareness, wildfire detection and disaster response, as well as the security of ports and critical infrastructure.
Altair-Next Gen satellites analyse what they observe while in orbit. The user gets an alert within seconds, the statement said. That is a significant change from conventional systems, which deliver data hours later, once it has been downloaded and processed.
"Fifty satellites is a threshold at which this becomes a permanent capability rather than periodic observation: with a fleet of this size, one satellite is always close to where an event is unfolding, so an alert delivered in seconds arrives while there is still time to act," the companies said.
Services will be run through an AI application store. Users pick the models they need, from several providers, and run them on shared satellites, enabling one constellation to serve many programmes at the same time.
"When we set out to build Altair, this is the future we bet on, that intelligence would move into orbit and that the UAE would be one of the places building it," said Hamdullah Mohib, chief executive Officer of Marlan Space and Orbitworks.
