Sasol Dubai MD Adam Mostert's application for land to build his new headquarters in Jebel Ali Free Zone has been delayed because the government has decided to build two new six-lane highways through the zone to ease traffic congestion. They haven't finalised the positions, so it can't allocate his land for another week or so.
The Dubai of popular imagination is the gargantuan high-rise property development and numerous warnings that the bubble is about to burst. But it's not the Dubai that counts.
That is a tiny trading and pearl fishing port on the southwestern edge of the Arabian Gulf that over 30 years has built itself into a regional business hub, serving a population of 2,2bn. It aims to be the dominant hub by 2020.
Dubai has not got where it is by throwing oil money into its economy. It has thrown itself into the business of being good for business. It's easy to get to and into.
Modern, high-quality offices are readily available, with probably the best communications infrastructure in the world, plenty of water and electricity and welcoming government officials eager to solve problems. And like any good business, they're as eager to make money out of solving those problems.
Trade, business and retailing make up 60% of its GDP; the glitzy real-estate market, with its man-made islands and plastic palaces, a mere 11%.
Any businessman moving into Dubai will have to go to the office of Abdulhamid Juma, the deputy director-general of the Dubai Development & Investment Authority.
"We give the applicant a wish list to tick off," say Juma. But what if he has exceptional wishes that are not on the list? "Our skill is dealing with exceptions," says Juma. And after six months the authority puts a price on making the that wish come true.
There are two ways to do business in Dubai. The businessman can set up his business as a normal business and join forces with a local "sponsor", a national who will own 51% of that business but not get 51% of the profits. Or he can operate in a free trade zone, own 100% of his business and be exempted from tax for 50 years.
Surprisingly, 75% of businesses are not in the free zones, according to the Dubai Chamber of Commerce, though the biggest outside the hotel, retail and property industries are.
Jebel Ali, where Sasol wants to build its office, is the biggest zone with 2 200 businesses operating from it.
There are many smaller, more specialised free trade hubs for health, sport, education, metals and commodities, flowers, car parts and trucks.
This is the heart of Dubai Inc - landlord of a vast warehouse and office portfolio. It's a profitable one, too, and what makes the sheikdom's vision sustainable.
Take Media City. It charges 120 dirhams (Dhs) per square foot per year (about R220/m² per month) for its 200 000 m² of space. It includes IT businesses and 180 TV stations. Tenants range from Microsoft, with 1 000 m², to CNN, with 100 m², to Reuters, Sony Broadcast & Professional, McGraw, Siemens, Canon, Logica, Sony Ericsson and Cisco. It is opening specialised subcities such as media production city.
There are 7 000 employees in Media City, many highly paid, who must live, shop and entertain themselves somewhere. They add to the 1,2m expatriates in this city of 1,4m.
It's not oil, but the vision of its rulers, Sheik Maktoum bin Rashid al Maktoum, the ruler and vice-president of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and his brothers Hamdan and Mahommed, that fuels the 200 000 Emirati in their headlong rush for growth.
"Everyone has that vision to be the trading and tourism centre of the region," says Saeed Nabouda, the young CEO of the Dubai Shopping Festival. It has driven him, and the 17 government and municipal departments who work with him and the private sector, to make the month-long festival the most successful in retail history, attracting 3m shoppers who spent Dhs6,6bn (R13bn). Every day one shopper wins a 1 kg bar of gold and there is a 100 kg bar to be won at the end of the festival.
"We are encouraged to be creative," says Ali Mahomed, deputy director-general at the department of economic development.
"If we want to start something, we can go to our department head - or over his head to the Sheik if necessary - to promote it."
