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Dubai Certifies The World’s First Purpose-Built Air Taxi Vertiport
The four-story VDX hub will handle up to 170,000 passengers a year, with three more vertiports already under development across the city.
Dubai’s air taxi ambitions have cleared their most consequential hurdle yet: somewhere to land. The UAE’s General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) has certified VDX, a facility developed by Skyports Infrastructure, as the world’s first purpose-built commercial vertiport for electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, opening the way for commercial air taxi services to begin in the emirate.
Officially registered as VDX under the GCAA certification process, the four-story facility spans approximately 3,100 square meters and houses two dedicated take-off and landing areas, rapid charging infrastructure for electric aircraft, and high throughput passenger facilities. Once commercial operations commence, it can accommodate up to 170,000 passengers annually.
VDX will serve as the first and primary hub in Dubai’s planned air taxi network, which Skyports is developing in collaboration with the city’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA). Three additional vertiports are currently under development.
Certification is the unglamorous half of the flying-taxi story, and arguably the harder one. The GCAA’s assessment covered the vertiport’s infrastructure, physical characteristics, operational procedures, safety management arrangements, emergency preparedness and regulatory compliance — a checklist that, until now, no purpose-built commercial vertiport anywhere had completed.
“The certification of the world’s first purpose-built commercial vertiport is a historic achievement for the UAE and a defining moment for the future of aviation,” said Saif Mohammed Al Suwaidi, Director-General of the GCAA. “The UAE is not only preparing for the future of aviation; it is actively shaping it and establishing new international benchmarks for Advanced Air Mobility”.
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Skyports Infrastructure CEO Duncan Walker called the milestone proof “that the infrastructure, operational standards and regulatory frameworks required for commercial eVTOL services are now a reality,” adding that construction of the wider network is progressing at pace.
The certification supports the “We the UAE 2031” vision and the Dubai Economic Agenda D33, positioning the emirate’s air taxi network as part of a broader push toward economic diversification and sustainable mobility.
News
Abu Dhabi’s Robot Kitchen Is Serving Up Biryani, Not Burgers
Circus SE wants to put a tiny automated factory inside the buildings where Gulf residents live and work, bypassing part of last-mile delivery.
The most telling thing about a new autonomous kitchen now running in Abu Dhabi’s Marina Square is what it won’t cook:
“We don’t do fast food,” says Nikolas Bullwinkel, Founder and CEO of Circus SE. “We’ve actively decided not to build a machine that can only do burgers”.
Instead, the CA-1 system is built around pot-based cooking: curries, pastas, soups and rice dishes. After experimenting with highly personalized recipes, Circus deliberately leaned back toward recognizable food. “We’re going with a chicken biryani because you know it,” Bullwinkel says of the AED 40 dish.
The Germany-based robotics and food technology company operates across eight countries, and Abu Dhabi is its first deployment outside Europe. More locations are expected there and in Dubai.
In Germany, its units can be placed in supermarkets, gas stations, airports and hospitals. In the Gulf, Bullwinkel wants them inside residential and office buildings, replacing some of the complexity of last-mile delivery. “We’re basically bringing a very tiny factory a few square meters into your building,” he says. Catering company Royal Prestige supplies the ingredients and knowledge of local tastes.
The CA-1 manages up to 36 refrigerated ingredient silos alongside automated induction cooking, robotic plating and a self-cleaning dishwasher. Two robotic arms move ingredients through the system with minimal human intervention. It can produce up to 120 hot meals an hour, and a meal such as rice and curry can take around three to four minutes.
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Five cameras and multiple sensors monitor heat, temperature and consistency, an attempt to approximate what a chef perceives. “You can hear something gets burned, you can smell it, you can see it at some point,” Bullwinkel says. CircusOS, the company’s operating system, adjusts recipes in real time.
You might think of the platform as a threat to kitchen staff, but Bullwinkel frames Circus as a way for chefs to develop recipes and distribute them at scale. With that being said, rising labor costs and shortages are also part of his case for automation.
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