ONE Residence Brings AI and Air Mobility to Abu Dhabi

ONE Development has entered Abu Dhabi with ONE Residence, a 31-storey waterfront tower on Al Reem Island. The building uses AI-managed operations and includes infrastructure for electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft and drone logistics, delivered through the Advanced Mobility Hub and VertiHub. It is a bet on how cities will change over the next decade, not just on how people live today.

Founder and chairman Ali Al Gebely argues the sector's future depends on communities that become more intelligent over time, with technology embedded into everyday life. His goal is not a building full of gadgets. It is a home that learns, becomes more responsive and runs more efficiently the longer residents stay. The industry has long treated completed buildings as finished products; Al Gebely sees that as a radical blind spot.

The eVTOL and drone infrastructure is the most visible piece of that forward orientation. It may look futuristic, but the logic is practical. The region is investing heavily in advanced air mobility. A building designed now will still be standing when those networks mature, and building the infrastructure from the start means the tower can plug into those networks later without a scramble to retrofit. For residents, it promises a home ready for a future in which commutes and parcels move through the air.

ONE Development is one of the UAE's newer names, but it sits inside Al Gebely Holding, a family-owned group with a 44-year history in construction, energy, technology, hospitality and investment. That parent gives the developer ballast and a modern outlook. Al Gebely's background spans economics, engineering and business. He treats real estate as the meeting point of infrastructure, technology and long-term operational performance.

The approach first showed up in Dubai. Laguna Residence sold out its initial release within weeks. ONE Development did not use AI as a marketing slogan. It embedded AI into planning, pricing, predictive maintenance and energy optimisation after handover, and used resident behaviour to shape amenities and shared spaces. The project validated the model. ONE Residence adapts it to Abu Dhabi's focus on innovation, sustainability and future mobility.

The timing depends on a market in transition. Abu Dhabi's population and investment are growing, and demand has shifted from standalone towers to integrated communities. Buyers want walkability, wellness, connected amenities and neighbourhoods built around daily life. Al Gebely says the UAE is entering a defining chapter in real estate, with each emirate adding to a vision of innovation and long-term value. Al Reem Island, a fast-maturing waterfront district near the capital's business core, anchors that confidence.

At the centre is ONE AI, a proprietary platform the company treats as a foundation rather than a feature. It applies artificial intelligence across a project's whole lifecycle: land analysis, pricing, predictive maintenance, energy management and operational performance after residents move in. The system runs quietly beneath each community, letting a building monitor itself, anticipate problems and keep improving long after handover.

ONE Residence is the first Abu Dhabi project, not the last. ONE Development plans to expand across the UAE and grow in Egypt and other international markets through a disciplined, long-term strategy. Al Gebely measures success by whether communities keep performing and appreciating after completion, not by project count. On Al Reem Island, that means building homes clever enough to improve with time.