Ras Al Khaimah and Skyports Sign Agreement for Four-Vertiport AAM Network

Ras Al Khaimah Trans­port Author­i­ty (RAKTA) and Sky­ports Infra­struc­ture have signed a bind­ing agree­ment to devel­op and oper­ate an Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty (AAM) infra­struc­ture net­work in Ras Al Khaimah, Unit­ed Arab Emi­rates.

The agree­ment cov­ers a planned net­work of four ver­ti­ports, with com­mer­cial AAM ser­vices tar­get­ed to begin in the third quar­ter of 2027. The project builds on a strate­gic part­ner­ship between RAKTA and Sky­ports that began in 2024.

The first phase will focus on two ver­ti­ports at Al Mar­jan Island and Jebel Jais. The loca­tions are intend­ed to pro­vide con­nec­tions between two major des­ti­na­tions in Ras Al Khaimah. Two addi­tion­al ver­ti­ports are planned in lat­er phas­es, sub­ject to fur­ther plan­ning, busi­ness case devel­op­ment and reg­u­la­to­ry require­ments.

The net­work is intend­ed to sup­port both trav­el with­in Ras Al Khaimah and con­nec­tions with oth­er emi­rates. Dubai is planned to be the first inter-emi­rate con­nec­tion, link­ing the Ras Al Khaimah net­work with AAM infra­struc­ture being devel­oped in Dubai.

Sky­ports will work with RAKTA on the devel­op­ment and oper­a­tion of the ver­ti­port infra­struc­ture. The facil­i­ties are being designed to accom­mo­date dif­fer­ent cer­ti­fied elec­tric ver­ti­cal take-off and land­ing (eVTOL) air­craft and approved oper­a­tors as the AAM sec­tor devel­ops.

The agree­ment fol­lows an ini­tial mem­o­ran­dum of under­stand­ing and a frame­work agree­ment signed between the two organ­i­sa­tions in 2025. The lat­est deal moves the pro­gramme from plan­ning towards imple­men­ta­tion, with devel­op­ment to con­tin­ue along­side local and fed­er­al author­i­ties.

RAKTA said the AAM net­work forms part of its wider trans­port plan­ning as Ras Al Khaimah expands its tourism, hos­pi­tal­i­ty, real estate and infra­struc­ture sec­tors. The project is also aligned with the emirate’s Com­pre­hen­sive Mobil­i­ty Plan 2030, which iden­ti­fies con­nec­tiv­i­ty, sus­tain­abil­i­ty, inno­va­tion and trans­port inte­gra­tion as pri­or­i­ties.

The planned net­work is expect­ed to com­ple­ment exist­ing road and pub­lic trans­port ser­vices by pro­vid­ing point-to-point con­nec­tions between select­ed des­ti­na­tions. Devel­op­ment will focus on safe­ty, reg­u­la­to­ry com­pli­ance, oper­a­tional readi­ness and inte­gra­tion with the wider trans­port net­work.

Thomas Sleightholm

Thomas is a con­tent writer for eVTOL Insights, cov­er­ing all aspects of the glob­al Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty ecosys­tem. Got a sto­ry for him? Please send an email to editorial@evtolinsights.com

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