Majid Al Futtaim to invest USD 3.4 bn in Egypt over five years, marking its first move into housing and hotels

Majid Al Futtaim will invest around USD 3.4 bn in Egypt over the next five years, more than it has spent here in 27 years, Khalifa Bin Braik, CEO of Majid Al Futtaim Asset Management, tells EnterpriseAM. The Emirati group’s cumulative investment in the market stands at some USD 2.8 bn. The new money goes into urban development, business complexes, and hospitality, taking the group past the four malls in Cairo and Alexandria, the Carrefour network, and the entertainment brands. “Egypt is an important, strategic market for the group,” Bin Braik says.

The money splits two ways. The larger share, close to USD 3 bn, goes to Mada City, the integrated city east of Cairo that the group is developing under its partnership with Midar. The remaining USD 400 mn funds developments adjacent to Mall of Egypt in west Cairo. The first is ELMNT33°, unveiled Monday with a EGP 457 mn price tag, spanning 5.3k sqm and combining dining, lifestyle, and flexible co-working, according to a statement (pdf). The second is Junction, the group’s first business complex in Egypt, carrying a total cost exceeding USD 386 mn (c. EGP 20 bn) for its first phase — likely an upward revision from the EGP 15 bn reported at launch in April 2025.

Mada City is the group’s first residential and hotel development in Egypt. “This is the first time we’ll go into residential,” Bin Braik says. “We decided to because we saw the demand is there, and investors and residents see big demand in this sector.” Preliminary works on Mada City will start within 12 to 18 months, kicking off a multi-year buildout spanning housing, office spaces, hotels, and a retail mall. The group is also partnering with Ennismore on a 25hours-branded property (pdf) at Junction, Bin Braik tells us, with operations expected to start within three years.

Why it matters: A Gulf mall operator turning residential developer is a wager on Egyptian housing demand at a point when the buyer base is thin and the market is going through a complete restructuring under a draft law governing who can build. Households that can carry current asking prices in the new cities start at a monthly income of EGP 150k and make up 6% of Greater Cairo’s population, industry insiders told EnterpriseAM earlier. More than 1k companies have entered development over the past decade without the pool of buyers widening to match.

Egypt helped prop up Majid Al Futtaim’s half-year numbers. The group posted record 1H EBITDA of AED 2.5 bn (c. USD 681 mn), up 11% y-o-y, on revenue of AED 17.5 bn (c. USD 4.77 bn), up 1.4%. Markets outside the GCC grew revenue 4% y-o-y, “supported by particularly strong growth in Egypt and Kenya,” the group said.

What’s next: The SHARE loyalty program, which has 14 mn customers across the UAE and Saudi Arabia, will launch in Egypt shortly, Bin Braik says. The group counts 600 mn visitors a year across its markets, 240 mn of them in its malls, and uses that data to set expansion strategy.