Hi everyone, and welcome to Valley of Depth. I'm your host Mo Islam. My guest today is Hamdullah Mohib, CEO of Orbit Works. Hamdullah's journey is rare. He served at the highest levels of government in Afghanistan, first as ambassador to the United States and later as national security adviser to the president, where he was responsible for national security strategy, crisis decision-making, and international coordination.
Today, he's building a commercial satellite manufacturing and services company in Abu Dhabi. We talk about how his background led him to co-found Marlon Space, a UAE-based space investment and operating company, and how Marlon partnered with Loft Orbital to launch Orbit Works. We explore the idea that space is ultimately about sovereignty, about making faster decisions with more control, and what it means when the Middle East starts building, not just buying space capability. Let's jump in. Alhamdulillah, thanks so much for being with us.
Well, thank you, Mo, for having me.
You know, you're my first guest from the region, so I feel honored that you've joined us here today.
Well, thank you. And we're also a new industry in the region. We're the only satellite facility that has been built commercially from scratch, so it's not uncommon that I would be the first one speaking here.
Fair enough. Well, before we talk about Orbit Works, I do want to talk a bit about your career path as far as space, because it is a bit unconventional compared to the folks that I typically interview here. You know, you've served at the highest levels of diplomacy and national security in Afghanistan, and now you're building a space infrastructure company in Abu Dhabi in the UAE. Tell me a little bit about your path from government and geopolitics to the space industry.
So, I think it may look unnatural and unconventional, but what I did in government was quite similar to what we're doing here now, and that is focus on sovereignty and enabling sovereign nations to be able to make decisions quickly and in a timely manner, but also efficiently and with more control at their disposal. I think Orbit Works, when we were forming, that was the main goal, thinking about how can, first of all, this region, which is very hot, as you know, both politically and also weather-wise, so you want to maybe be able to make decisions to enable the governments here to be able to make decisions quickly and efficiently. But then looking at the broader region, there is quite a significant amount of interest in satellite services, and we think we're addressing that need.
So when you were operating in government, how did you think about space at the time? Was it on your mind? Was it part of your own sort of agenda at the time? Or was it something like, hey, you know, at some point in my career, I'd like to get into this industry.
It was a key interest. Being able to have the kind of visibility that airborne units provide you can be the deciding factor between a life saved or a life lost. We unfortunately in Afghanistan didn't have access to satellite services and imagery at the time. We didn't, of course our allies did, and sometimes we utilized them, but we ourselves didn't have access, and it always piqued my interest to see what else can be done with those services. Being in an area that was conflict-driven and not being able to access population centers, a government which had to plan a budget, not just security element, but planning a budget and being able to prepare for providing people with services. Sometimes we also relied on satellite imagery, as much as even population density calculation was done through satellite imagery. Now those services didn't come from us, they came from the UN at the time, but they were able to give us the kind of insights that helped us govern better. And so it has always been an area of interest for me, and I understood that it has broader capacity than what we were exposed to, and I can see that being proven with every day in my job now.
So let's just dive into Orbit Works for a second here. So for someone hearing about the company for the first time, and my assumption is that there are a number of folks who are listening to this who may be hearing about it for the first time, considering it is also a relatively new project, how do you explain the company, maybe, and what you guys do right now?
So the way I would describe Orbit Works is a satellite manufacturer at its core. At start, we partnered with another firm that built satellite services in the US and also has a base in Europe to piggyback on their flight heritage and expertise to build and jumpstart a satellite manufacturing capability here in Abu Dhabi. That's at its core. We're working on a constellation that would be largely serving this region, but not exclusively. We are talking to customers in Europe and in the broader region, in the broader MENA region, but also Africa and Southeast Asia to use that constellation for their needs.
Mhm. And this other company is Loft Orbital.
Yeah. So tell me more about that partnership, because it's not just Loft Orbital, right? There's another entity here, Marlon Space, which you were involved in. Tell me about sort of that partnership and what each entity brings to the table.
So, Marlon Space is an investor-operator based in the UAE, and Loft Orbital is a San Francisco-based company that also has offices in Toulouse and also in Golden. And they built satellites and constellations for customers both commercial and also federal, and they have another entity called Loft Federal that's focused on government services. We partnered with them because we really like their model. We are starting from scratch. And the model that Loft offered was not a specific set of hardware, but more a knowledge transfer that we could rely on and build, and then start to build our own capabilities as we go along. So we liked that they were business-focused and that they were focused on building satellites, which is what we wanted to build here. And so we partnered with them, and Orbit Works was formed. We built the facility here in Abu Dhabi, actually not far from where I'm sitting. It's about between Abu Dhabi and Dubai. There's a reason why we put it in this place called Kizad. And the facility was finished last year in November. We launched it in November. We started in December 2024 and finished it in November and launched it in November 2025. We have full staff that we hired from across the world, including the US, Europe, here in the region, India, and we are still building our staff capability. But we have a full team that's working on the first constellation now. As I said, our first satellite would be launched in October this year.
So I want to go back. So you use the word 'we' a number of times. When you say 'we', are you referring to the UAE? Are you like sort of speaking on behalf of the UAE and the region? I'm curious because Marlon Space obviously has deep ties with the government of UAE. So maybe tell me a little bit about sort of the perspective that you're using there.
When I say 'we', we say Orbit Works because it's a joint venture. It's a joint venture between Marlon Space and, sorry, Loft Orbital. But also the model that we have applied for building Orbit Works is quite similar to a lot of Silicon Valley companies. The employees are also owners. They have shares. They have equity in the company. And so when I say 'we', I am inclusive of all of us, both our partner Loft, but also the staff, the employees that are part of Orbit Works.
So tell me more about the decision to partner with Loft Orbital, right? Because we've had Pierre Damien on the show in the past, and we're familiar with the Loft model, but tell us a little bit about what appealed to you within the Loft model as far as partnership goes, because there's a lot of companies out there in the satellite bus space. We've covered them. It's competitive, and I'm certain that there are a number of other partners that you could have chosen. Tell us a little bit about what made the partnership with Loft particularly interesting and aligned with your goals.
We liked the Loft model because it's not tied to a single piece of hardware, and so we can attract hardware. We could buy hardware from Europe, from America. Right now we are acquiring some payloads from South Africa. So we're going global to acquire all of that hardware. We did not want to be tied to a single piece of hardware that would require years of modification if we need to modify it for application, because we're new. We're starting a completely new industry, and there is no commercial space manufacturing capabilities here. There are some research centers, but there's also the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre that build satellites. Those are quite bespoke services that they have for largely federal needs. And to be able to build a commercial satellite company, we needed to be as flexible as we could be. And with the Loft model, what they have proprietary is the hub which sits between the bus and the payload, and then cockpit that lets us operate it, and that's their proprietary technology. So we can switch between buses and payloads as we like, depending on what kind of customer we serve. We wanted to build a company, and we could build from scratch. We could start building our own bus. We could start also building our own payloads. But to be able to do it faster and start serving customers, we could start with this model where it's quicker, and in the process as we bring our team together, we also learn, but we learn in the process of serving customers. And then when we are ready to commit to a single piece of hardware, a bus perhaps, we can then go and make that kind of a partnership or start building it ourselves. But right from the outset, we didn't know if we could commit to a hardware-fixed company model because we didn't know what kind of customer demands there are going to be. We could expect some, but we don't know all of the customer demands, and we wanted to have that level of flexibility which will allow us to serve a wide array of clients, especially in the early years. When Orbit Works is mature and we know the products that it's going to fix its focus on, it would be a different story.
So, is the partnership with Loft currently structured as like a JV? Is it a licensing agreement? What does that partnership look like?
It's a joint venture. We have access to their technology, and they will have access to whatever we develop here at Orbit Works, which they are... the constellation that we're building together, because we're still borrowing quite a lot of expertise from Loft. But it's a UAE-native, UAE-built, UAE-designed and largely engineered here product that Loft will have access to. So we are in our first year now, we are in the first year of operation, I would say, because last year we were busy building the team and the facility. We are already contributing to their product line. So we have that reciprocal agreement in which we both benefit from each other's knowledge and the products we build.
And then my final question on just more of the origin. Did this partnership come together as sort of necessity, meaning like you were looking for a partner, or was there kind of the original thought process around Orbit Works is like, hey, let's try, like we should develop the technology and everything from the ground up, but then it just so happened that there was this partnership kind of arose and it made sense. Like I'm curious from the very beginning, were you thinking about it from the perspective of a partnership, you know, partnering with another kind of organization that has built XYZ already that we can kind of integrate into our own, into the region.
It actually was an evolutionary process. We started with, you know, Marlon Space is an investment company, well, was investing in space funds. Bolyne is one of those funds that we invested in, and so we were looking at what other companies exist, and there are some direct investments that Marlon Space also made in True Anomaly. So we were looking at companies and scouting space companies, knowing that there is a UAE policy interest in building native capabilities. We wanted to see what is available, but then there is also an element of long-term partnership with Loft. A founder, Pierre, spent quite a significant amount of time here in the UAE. His uncle used to be here, an adviser to the air force, and spent some early time at the space agency when it was being developed, advising and helping with the space agency's development. So it was a natural fit for multiple reasons. One, we like the business model. Second, we liked that team and the founders' commitment to the UAE. When we're talking to founders or companies, they don't always understand the region well enough to understand how to do business, but also the level of patience required to do business here. And so with Loft, we had multiple of those things coming together. We had a founder who knew the region well and had longstanding commitments and a proven track record here. We also had a technology that we agreed and thought was going to be a good fit for it, and then the business model worked really well for us. And so all of those things came together, and we were able to form that joint venture.
I want to go on a slight tangent because you brought up something that is an interesting topic area for me. So you mentioned a founder who has expertise and connection to the region. There is no doubt a lot of founders and executives who travel to the Middle East, particularly the UAE, in search of capital. And tell me a little bit about the importance of building connectivity in the region before you make an ask like, hey, you know, we need, you know, because I think the Middle East for a lot of Western founders is viewed as like, you know, the capital of capital, like where there's a lot of investors and a potential to source, you know, large funding rounds. It doesn't work like that, right? It's not that easy. So tell me a little bit about the importance of actually building, you know, some type of root or, you know, kind of long-standing connection there in the region.
So, you're absolutely right. A lot of founders come to the Middle East thinking, especially the GCC region and in the UAE, to raise money, and they are singularly focused on that agenda, which can sometimes be counterproductive because they probably don't spend enough time in building relationships, which is something that is necessary. But they are successful in being able to raise money because there are investors who would like to put money in technologies, and there are quite sophisticated investors that would look at largely American startups based on their track record. They're quite sophisticated in their investment thesis. So as much as you can raise money from a US VC, you can also raise it from family offices and venture capital funds here in the region. That happens, I would say. The ones that are more successful, who are able to repeatedly come back, usually look at those long-term relationships and build partnerships. In the GCC, most of the countries are looking to deploy their funds in such a way that would also create some in-country value. And so most of the sovereign wealth funds have now adopted an in-country value creation formula in which they expect you to do something here. And then there is also in the UAE specifically, partnership being encouraged, because what it does is it doesn't just deploy capital. It also creates a knowledge-based economy, which is what the UAE is very intensely focused on. To move away from the oil economy and create a knowledge-based economy, they need to deploy their capital more effectively. And our partnership is a good example of that. This is not just yet another project, but it's a more strategic project that is going to create not just the sovereign capability to build space assets, but also the knowledge base that would be required to build on it. And hopefully in the next decade, when you think of 10 places to buy space assets, satellites, you would think of Abu Dhabi as one of those places to be. And so that would be an achievement. And I think founders should start thinking about how they can fit into that model when they come to Abu Dhabi to raise money, but also maybe contribute more value here that they could create a more permanent presence.
Got it. Okay. Well, we're going to talk a bit more about the region specifically, but I do want to jump back to Orbit Works now. So tell me about the Alter constellation. That's the first major program. What is that? What is that going to look like?
So Alter is our first effort at building our own native constellation that serves multiple purposes. One, we want to move away from providing satellite imagery, which is what largely most of the current customers are buying, to information-based services and satellite as a service. And so we have multiple sensors on our satellites, and then we have onboard compute. The product we're building is to enable both commercial and sovereign clients to have information. So as an example, one of the examples for our region would be oil companies. Let's say you're ADNOC. You have really nice imagery of your facilities in the sea, and you know you have your installations on the ground, storage facilities, pipelines. But what you are more interested in is how do you ensure the safety of your installations, and if there is a gas leak or an oil spill, that you be informed. And that's what we are trying to do, turn Alter into an application-focused constellation that serves, of course, limited but focused on certain clients that will be able to make decisions quicker, save some money, and it would be a constellation as a service that we offer.
And you mentioned both sovereign and commercial. Where do you think the near-term sort of opportunity is, right? Are you truly focusing on this dual-use capability, or do you foresee perhaps the government being a larger use case for this constellation?
Well, no space company can survive without a government being one of the anchor customers. So obviously we will have a significant amount of focus on serving sovereign clients more than commercial, but in the process we're building our applications so that it is really dual-use. And there are a lot of applications, like I said, you know, we can do... satellites are already used for a lot of civilian services that are underrated, perhaps, because corporations are not as deep-pocketed clients. So satellite manufacturers or service providers have largely focused on sovereign clients, which I think is unfortunate because I think it has also stifled innovation in this space. And we want to at least have a significant amount of our focus on those commercial clients and be able to serve them with applications that will solve their problems. And so we spend a lot of time thinking about what kind of clients can we serve. The oil companies, for example, is just a very obvious example because they're right here in this region, has an immediate need. But the applications are quite enormous, from population density management, smart cities, to autonomous vehicles and the management of traffic. The services are unlimited. It's just how well we use those sensors. So on our satellite we have five sensors, and we want to see how a combination of those sensors could be used to serve a diversity of clients.
What is the architecture of the constellation? So how many satellites is it going to look like? When are those going to be launched? And when will the constellation be at its sort of mature state?
The first constellation is 10 satellites. First one is being launched in October this year, and then we will have the other nine launched throughout 2027. And so by the end of 2027, we should have all 10 in orbit. And that's when, by the end of 2027, when it will be at its peak capacity.
Got it. Okay. And let's go back and talk about the manufacturing facility that you're building. So that's, you said between Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and tell me the name of the exact location again.
Well, the short acronym is Kizad, but the long name is Khalifa Industrial Area. Kizad stands for...
