Dubai tycoon brothers' competition spills over to region

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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates --  Dubai Festival City, Mall of the Emirates and City Center are among Dubai's most prominent landmarks. These multibillion-dollar enterprises are owned by one family, whose wealth has multiplied despite sibling rivalry that has, in fact, proved most beneficial for the emirate's expansion.

Often described as the 'pillars of Dubai', the Futtaim brothers, Abdullah and Majid, seem to own half of the emirate, as many here say in jest. But the real humor behind their story is that a quarrel between the two brothers over inherited wealth has actually led to Dubai's expansion.

The death of their father - the founder of the Futtaim group - in the 1990s left Abdullah and Majid with a huge empire, but the loss of the business tycoon also meant the beginning of rivalry between his two sons, whose endless squabbling over the inheritance eventually prompted the arbitration of Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum.

The two argued over who was to inherit what, and there was a lot of 'what'; the Futtaims do not only own the major shopping malls of Dubai but are also strongholds in the automobile, insurance and real estate industries.

International brand names like Volvo, Panasonic, Toyota, Ikea and Toys 'r Us are synonymous with the Futtaims.

While their split was lamented by locals here, many agree that it is that same rivalry-sparked discord that has inspired them to outdo one another in terms of business expansion and innovation.

"Theirs is a popular story of a family torn apart over an inheritance dispute and that is sad," says a local businessman who preferred not to be named. "However, it is obvious that the dispute brewed competition between them and resulted in many outstanding projects in Dubai."

The affluent Abdullah expanded his business massively after his partnership with his brother was dismantled. He is said to have unleashed his creative edge since the split in the year 2000.

His latest project has won him lots of acclaim: the $4 billion to $5 billion Dubai Festival City (DFC) is to be the biggest mixed-used development project in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The project, described as a 'city within the city', is slated to be completed by 2012. The city is to host golf courses, hundreds of villas, shopping malls, a business park, several residential districts and a 50-storey festival tower.

While Abdullah was busy engineering his massive waterfront crescent and retail complex, Majid was preoccupied in developing a unique shopping center in the heart of Dubai - the Mall of the Emirates.

The mall, which was inaugurated in 2005, features the world's largest indoor ski slope, and has certainly added to Dubai's flare and sophistication.

But it seems that the Futtaim brothers' thirst for further achievement is far from being quenched; the billionaires are expanding their ventures overseas and the competition is still as hot as ever.

While Abdullah's Futtaim group has recently announced plans to spend $1.9 billion on a massive real estate venture in Cairo, the Majid Futtaim Group (MAF) is eyeing Oman as the next target for investment.

"This is a large mixed-use project that we are building. We are busy with the infrastructure work and roads," the Futtaim group's managing director for development Brett Schafer said of the Cairo project.

"We are searching for a site in Muscat to open another major mall but it would be away from the present Muscat City Center in Seeb," Graham Dreverman, CEO of MAF Shopping Malls LLC, told the Gulf News recently. "We are on the lookout and cannot give further details," he said.

He added that the MAF Group had regional expansion plans: "We now have seven malls, including two in Egypt and one in Muscat but we aim to take that number to 19 by 2010 and 40 in the region by 2015."

Since their rift several years ago, the brothers' rivalry has taken on a different meaning for Emiratis, who are appreciative of the siblings' shrewd business sense.

"This is not about money anymore. It goes beyond their personal wealth; this is about who will come up with the more prestigious and lucrative business for Dubai," says the businessman. "We [Emiratis] admire them and are also on the look out for what they have to offer the Dubai market."

Between the two of them, the Futtaim brothers reportedly employ over 20,000 people in Dubai alone and that number is likely to grow.

This year, Abdullah ranked number 562 among the world's richest people with an estimated wealth of $1.4 billion, while Majid's $1 billion got him the 746th rank, according to Forbes magazine.

By Natasha Bukhari

© Middle East Times 2006