EDGE Group
EDGE is the consolidated defense-industrial platform of the United Arab Emirates — the principal UAE counterparty in global defense procurement and a competitive participant in the Middle East defense-export market. Its Israeli engagement is partly complementary, partly competitive.
| Type | Consolidated defense-industrial platform |
| Founded | 2019 |
| Headquarters | Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates |
| Owner | Government of Abu Dhabi |
| CEO | Hamad Al Marar |
| Scope | Air defense, smart weapons, electronic warfare, missiles, autonomous systems, defense services |
EDGE Group is the consolidated defense-industrial platform of the United Arab Emirates, formed in 2019 by combining more than two dozen previously separate state-affiliated defense and security entities into a unified operating structure. The consolidation anchored EDGE as the principal UAE counterparty in global defense procurement and as a competitive participant in the broader Middle East and global defense-export market.
EDGE runs across five domains: platforms and systems (manned and unmanned aerial systems, naval and land platforms), missiles and weapons, electronic warfare and cyber, defense services, and strategic capability development. The group includes more than two dozen subsidiary operating companies covering specific industrial layers, concentrated in domains historically central to UAE defense procurement.
Following the 2020 Abraham Accords and the 2022 Israel-UAE CEPA, a limited set of UAE-Israel defense-industrial engagements has been publicly disclosed. EDGE has signed cooperation agreements with several Israeli defense exporters in specialized domains, primarily where the two industrial bases are complementary rather than competitive — Israeli capability in electronic warfare, air defense, and certain missile categories pairs with UAE platform-and-systems capability in some defense-procurement architectures.
The EDGE-Israeli relationship is partly complementary and partly competitive. Complementary where the two industrial bases produce different capabilities; competitive where both industries chase similar export markets and where the EDGE growth trajectory contemplates capturing demand currently served by Israeli industry. The disclosed scope and value of EDGE-Israeli agreements is typically limited by dual-use export-control requirements and by bilateral framework restraints.
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Sources
EDGE Group corporate disclosures; The National (UAE); Bloomberg; published research. Data current as of Q2 2026.