Business in Ras Al Khaimah in 2026: the AI free zone Innovation City and record RAKEZ growth
RAKEZ registered close to 19,000 new companies in 2025 — a 44% year-on-year jump, taking the zone past 40,000 active businesses. Next door, Innovation City is coming online: an AI, Web3 and robotics free zone built on the site of the former RAK DAO.
Dubai remains the default choice for company registration in the UAE, but Ras Al Khaimah is increasingly working as a genuine alternative — a lower entry cost and a growing niche around technology. Two developments from 2025–2026 make the case: record growth at the RAKEZ economic zone, and the relaunch of the emirate’s digital free zone under a new name and a different focus.
RAKEZ: 19,000 new companies in a year
According to the zone itself, RAKEZ registered close to 19,000 new companies in 2025 — a 44% year-on-year increase, taking the total number of active businesses in the zone past 40,000. RAKEZ Group CEO Ramy Jallad tied the growth to sustained investor confidence and the emirate’s position as a competitive, reliable base for global business; a notable share of the growth sits in industrial and technology-enabled segments, from advanced manufacturing to logistics. Company registration in RAKEZ under the 2026 price list starts from AED 6,010 with no visa, or AED 12,010 with one residence visa, with 100% foreign ownership and 0% corporate tax for companies that qualify as Qualifying Free Zone Persons (QFZP).
Innovation City: a free zone rebuilt around AI
Next to RAKEZ, Innovation City is being built out in Ras Al Khaimah — a rebrand of the former digital zone RAK DAO (Ras Al Khaimah Digital Assets Oasis), announced in September 2025. The zone bills itself as the world's first free zone where regulation, licensing and part of the service layer run on artificial intelligence rather than just a digital filing system. It targets five sectors: Web3 and digital assets, artificial intelligence, gaming and iGaming, robotics, and healthtech and digital health. In May 2026 the zone announced the launch of the world's first blockchain-based digital business identity system with IOPn — a step that builds company registration itself into blockchain infrastructure rather than merely recording it there.
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What it means for the emirate's property market
Two zones with different profiles — the industrial and logistics-focused RAKEZ, and the tech-focused Innovation City — create two distinct streams of demand for housing and offices: one closer to the airport and industrial parks, the other pulled toward the emirate's coastal and new business clusters. Both are growing alongside the construction already under way on Al Marjan Island around the country's first casino — see our coverage of the Al Marjan branded residences and how the UAE regulates its gaming industry. Company growth at RAKEZ and the Innovation City launch are the same trend seen from a different angle: Ras Al Khaimah is building business demand for property, not only tourist demand.
For more on how the emirate's property market is shaping up around Al Marjan, see Al Marjan Island branded residences.
Video on this topic
The same subject on the English channel — each clip has a written version of its own.
15:43Nobu in Ras Al Khaimah and Abu Dhabi: why the RAK one is the more interesting asset10 December 2023
13:37Al Marjan Island plots: what the branded launches in Ras Al Khaimah are actually built on10 December 2023
19:45Oceano on Al Marjan Island: the Luxe Developers project and the island being built around it14 August 2026
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