Dubai Taxi Revenue Rises 26% on National Taxi Deal, but Quarterly Profit Falls 25%

The quarter was the first to include National Taxi, whose acquisition closed on July 8 and which contributed Dh168 million of revenue. Stripped of that contribution, the picture for DTC's own operations was weaker: taxi revenue fell 6% from a year earlier, EBITDA dropped 14.4% and net profit declined 49.4%. The company pointed to higher fuel prices, operating expenses and financing costs, on top of lower airport- and tourism-related travel.

The results matter beyond one operator because DTC is a bellwether for Dubai's visitor economy and for the emirate's push into ride-hailing and autonomous transport. With National Taxi, the company says it now accounts for about 59% of Dubai's taxi market.

Group EBITDA rose 10% to Dh166.5 million in the quarter, although margins narrowed. For the first nine months of 2026, revenue slipped 1.5% to Dh1.77 billion, net profit fell 55.5% to Dh118.3 million and EBITDA dropped 25.1% to Dh364.4 million. The comparison is with a strong 2025, when DTC reported third-quarter net profit of Dh76.4 million, up 28%.

The combined business completed 18.5 million taxi and limousine trips in the quarter. DTC's existing operations handled 12.4 million, down 5.3%, and National Taxi 6.1 million, down 5.2%. The decline narrowed through the period: DTC's standalone trips were 7.8% lower in July, 6.2% lower in August and 1.9% lower in September. Airport trips reached 1.07 million, 40% more than in the preceding quarter.

"Although lower airport- and tourism-related demand continued to affect underlying performance, mobility trends improved steadily through the period, with September trip volumes significantly higher than July and approaching prior-year levels," said Mansoor Rahma Alfalasi, the group's chief executive. The company said this gave it more confidence that demand was returning towards earlier levels going into the fourth quarter, while acknowledging that near-term conditions remain softer than at the start of the year.

The acquisition has more than doubled DTC's borrowings. Net debt stood at Dh2 billion at the end of September, against Dh930.3 million a year earlier, mainly because of financing for the deal. The company held Dh425.6 million in cash and liquid investments and said it would focus on gradually reducing debt.

DTC said integration of National Taxi was about 30% complete, ahead of schedule, and had produced Dh3.9 million of savings and other financial benefits in the quarter. The combined fleet stands at 15,388 vehicles, up 16.7%, with 9,344 operational taxis at the end of September. It had put 450 of 600 newly acquired taxi plates into service by then.

Growth came from smaller lines. Delivery bike revenue rose 75.2% to Dh32.1 million, while taxi revenue including National Taxi grew 27.2% to Dh643.4 million. Limousine revenue fell 2.8% to Dh27 million and bus revenue was broadly flat at Dh29.6 million. On Bolt, where DTC added 1,607 Arabia Taxi vehicles during the quarter, trips rose 52% to 2.3 million.

After the quarter ended, DTC renewed for five years its agreement with Hala, the ride-hailing venture of Dubai's Roads and Transport Authority and Careem, through which more than 120 million rides on DTC and National Taxi vehicles have been booked since 2019.

The company also opened the first phase of an ultra-fast electric vehicle charging hub with 24 points, part of a planned network of more than 200, and had 846 fully electric cars in its taxi and limousine fleet. It said it continued its autonomous vehicle rollout with Apollo Go and moved its core technology systems onto a UAE sovereign cloud platform. Completing the National Taxi integration, expanding ride-hailing and improving fleet utilisation are its stated priorities for the months ahead.