The UAE’s new six-month mission to the International Space Station will help the country's space programme to reach even greater heights, a senior UAE official has said.
One Emirati astronaut will be part of the Nasa-SpaceX Crew-6 mission scheduled to launch in the spring of 2023 from Florida's Kennedy Space Centre, it was announced on Friday.
It will be the first long-term space mission by an Arab country and a nation that is not an international partner on the ISS.
The UAE’s Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre secured the mission by purchasing a seat from Axiom Space, a space travel and infrastructure company in Houston, Texas.
Spacewalks and operating ISS systems were among many practices covered during their sessions
Salem Al Marri,
Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre
Salem Al Marri, director general of the centre, said the mission would help the UAE to become a major player in spaceflight.
“The exciting new era of human spaceflight entered a new phase with the signing of an agreement between MBRSC and Axiom Space,” he said.
“This mission marks a milestone in the UAE’s rapid growth in the space sector, solidifying our position as a key player in human spaceflight.
“The UAE will become the region's first and the world's 11th country to send astronauts on long-duration space missions to the ISS.”
Axiom Space, which is acting as a tour operator, has arranged trips to the orbiting laboratory before, including a two-week stay on the station for four private astronauts, who paid $55 million each.
Axiom paid SpaceX to send these astronauts to the space station using a Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft.
But the UAE’s flight was arranged because Nasa owed Axiom a seat on one of their missions, after the company gave up its Russian Soyuz seat for US astronaut Mark Vande Hei in 2021.
The space centre took advantage of that opportunity and was able to buy the seat from Axiom.
Emirati astronauts trained by Nasa
All four of the UAE's astronauts have trained at Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre, meaning they qualify for Nasa-led missions.
Emerging space nations such as the UAE that are seeking more opportunities for their astronauts will continue to benefit from the rise of commercial space companies such as Axiom and SpaceX.
The space centre which has a strong partnership with Nasa, is likely to be able to buy more seats in future from American private companies as it continues to strengthen its astronaut corps.
“Our Emirati astronauts are highly equipped for this mission, having undergone a rigorous training programme that prepared them to conduct long-duration missions,” said Mr Al Marri.
“Spacewalks and operating ISS systems were among many practices covered during their sessions.”
The UAE has four members in its astronaut corps, including Maj Hazza Al Mansouri, the first Emirati in space, and former IT professional Dr Sultan Al Neyadi.
They have completed one year of training in Russia and almost two years in Houston.
The latest astronauts are Dubai Police helicopter pilot Mohammed Al Mulla and mechanical engineer Nora Al Matrooshi, the first Arab female astronaut. Both began their training at Nasa in January.
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Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
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Analysis
Members of Syria's Alawite minority community face threat in their heartland after one of the deadliest days in country’s recent history. Read more
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
