Prime Highlights
- Innovation City’s system replaces static business licences with living, blockchain-verified digital identities that work across borders and AI-driven platforms.
- The launch directly supports the UAE’s directive to move 50% of federal government services to agentic AI within two years.
Key Facts
- Innovation City is an AI-powered free zone located in Ras Al Khaimah, UAE, focused on technology-driven business registration and digital infrastructure.
- IOPn’s OPN Chain is an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain capable of processing over 10,000 transactions per second with sub-second finality.
Background
Innovation City, an AI-powered free zone in Ras Al Khaimah, UAE, has launched what it calls the world’s first blockchain-based digital business identity system. A digital identity, enabled by the OPN Chain Blockchain ecosystem of IOPn, has been provided to every firm registered under the free zone. This initiative replaces static licences for businesses with dynamic and immutable digital tokens that can be checked in real time from anywhere globally.
It is part of a wider government directive by the UAE to move half of all federal government sectors into agentic AI within two years. Innovation City says its system provides the foundational identity layer that autonomous AI agents need to process licences, permits, compliance checks and cross-border interactions at scale.
Innovation City’s CEO, Paul Dawalibi, said the company now gives businesses a verifiable identity that travels with them across borders and into the age of intelligent agents, marking the end of paper-based and database-dependent identity systems. IOPn’s CEO, Mojtaba Asadian, described OPN Chain as sovereign infrastructure built to scale across jurisdictions and institutions, calling it the backbone of the UAE’s emerging agentic AI economy.
There are some practical benefits offered by this approach. These include real-time validation by banks, regulators, investors, and AI agents; reduced potential for document tampering and shell corporation establishment; and auditability of any change to ownership records and regulatory compliance. The platform uses Layer 1 blockchain technology that is compatible with EVMs and capable of performing 10,000+ transactions per second with sub-second finality.
For Innovation City, this transition can be seen as one from procedural efficiency to strategic business advantage in today’s digital global economy.
