With 100,000 golden visas, UAE comes up with plan to attract top talent

DUBAI - In what appears to be an exciting news for those associated with tech sector,  the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is planning to award approximately 100,000 golden visas to the leading programmers across the world.

The UAE's Golden visa is a long-term residency option and is much sought after by professionals from different fields scattered in all parts of the world. The offer to grant Golden Visas in such large numbers comes as the emirate aims to transform itself into a tech investment center.

Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications, and Chairman of Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy, Omar Sultan Al Olama referred to the need for digital transformation and underlined that the emirate wants to maximize the potential of the digital economy, whose growth has doubled as quickly than global GDP over the last two decades.

The remarks were made at the tenth edition of the Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy’s software development and artificial intelligence (AI) workshop which was attended by business tycoons, entrepreneurs, industrialists and journalists amongst others. 

Al Olama opined that a plan was being drafted with relevant stakeholders for strengthening the digital sector by ensuring that government decisions prompt innovation and business friendliness across the board.

“The UAE is involving all relevant parties in building a clear roadmap to stimulate digital industries, and ensure that current government policies, initiatives and strategies promote innovation and business friendliness for all sectors,” he said.

Dubai has been a leading country when it comes to banking, hoteling and services sector but the country's aim to move towards technology and reap its benefits comes from its ideology to diversify the revenue streams of the country in much the same fashion as the kingdom of Saudi Arabia is thinking. 

The Golden Visa for tech professionals is in line with the vision that technology would change the world and innovation is the next big thing to be pursued by countries if they want to stay float in the age of digital transformation. 

Both United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia seem to have made it a point that the age of oil has long gone and new trends like Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, Business Analytics and other fields are the ones to be pursued. The bid to attract programmers through the Golden Visas seems to be a step towards the same direction.

First implemented in 2019, the UAE Golden Visa residency programme enables expats to live, work, and study in the UAE without the need of a national sponsor and with 100 percent ownership of their business on the UAE’s mainland.

With the promulgation of Fresh regulations, the UAE Golden Visa will grant 10-year residence to investors, entrepreneurs, exceptional talents, scientists and professionals, outstanding students and graduates, humanitarian pioneers, and frontline heroes, who pass certain eligibility benchmark.

The UAE is bagging multiple awards when it comes to immigration as its passport is also the world’s most powerful travel document.

Travellers carrying a UAE passport can enter 180 countries hassle-free; this means seven more countries than European countries such as Germany and Sweden, and nine more than Japan, whose travel document was ranked as the world’s best earlier this year in a list published by Henley & Partners.