UK signs FTA with the Gulf Cooperation Council: What’s in it for tech?

Yesterday (21/05/2026), DBT announced that the UK has signed an FTA with the Gulf Cooperation Council, comprised of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait. This is the GCC’s first FTA with a G7 economy. DBT estimates the deal will remove an estimated £580 million in duties every year.

Below, we outline what was (and wasn’t) in the deal for the tech sector and analyse what it means for the future of trade with the Gulf.

What is (and is not) in the deal

Regarding the tech sector, the Deal is largely focused on ensuring that UK firms providing Professional Business Services and financial services can access the GCC’s market on an equal footing to local suppliers without having a physical presence in the Gulf. There are several provisions designed to do this, outlined below:

Services, Data and Digital Trade

DBT have touted the digital trade aspects of the FTA as one of the Deal’s key successes. The Deal includes binding provisions to secure the free flow of data in and out of the GCC’s jurisdiction. The aim is to allow businesses in the tech and financial sectors to store and process client data outside of the GCC’s jurisdiction, and comes as part of wider reforms to open and secure market access for firms without a physical presence in the GCC.

However, while the financial services sector has a dispute resolution mechanism to enforce these provisions, the digital chapter has no enforcement mechanism. This limits the utility of this aspect of the deal for businesses, especially given GCC countries such as Saudi Arabia have strong data localisation laws.

In digital trade, the Deal mandates that the UK and GCC accept electronic trade documents, promote paperless trading, encourage the use of electronic bills of lading and other commercial trade documents, and includes a version of the e-commerce Moratorium that bans customs duties on digital trade.

In telecoms, the deal guarantees UK businesses market access to the GCC’s telecoms networks and services on a fair basis with local firms, preventing regulators and major suppliers from discriminating against UK firms. There are also provisions in the Deal that commits both parties to ongoing collaboration on innovation and future developments in the telecoms space.

Skills and qualification recognition

A significant amount of the Deal focuses on promoting labour mobility for skilled employees. The Deal includes commitments to remove administrative barriers facing professionals providing services in the UAE, and also includes commitments from the GCC to refrain from introducing further economic need testing requirements or numerical restrictions for their visa regimes.

Alongside this, the Deal includes provisions to lock in existing access arrangements for GCC markets, with DBT citing the recognition of UK legal qualifications in Saudi Arabia, and the UK and GCC have also committed to encourage relevant bodies in their respective jurisdictions to enter discussions on the recognition of professional qualifications, where such an interest exists.

Investor-State Dispute Settlement

The Deal includes an ISDS mechanism designed to protect investments made by Uk firms in the GCC, and vice-versa. DBT have specified that the ISDS mechanism respects the rights of each country to regulate in the public interest, including cognises the UK’s right to pursue its own environmental policies to meet its carbon targets.

What is missing?

The Deal does not include any provision on the climate and sustainability. The Deal also does not include any major provisions on human rights and labour conditions for workers.

There are provisions designed to prevent countries gaining a competitive advantage by weakening their labour laws or by lowering their environmental standards, but these protections are not enforceable.

Analysis

While it is welcome the Deal includes solid commitments to prevent data localisation and to facilitate digital trade by UK service providers, the lack of enforcement mechanisms outside of financial services severely limits the utility of this chapter by preventing any commitments being secure for businesses in the long run. Similarly, the lack of any real language on climate, sustainability and labour rights is disappointing.

On the positive side, the Deal shows the UK Government is serious about growing the UK’s trade in services, a reflection of the fact that most UK exports are in services and are digitally-delivered, through facilitating market access to the GCC for firms based in the UK. These commitments would provide a great benefit to SMEs particularly by removing administrative barriers to trade they are less equipped to overcome by expanding market access to firms with no GCC presence, easing travel between the UK and GCC and through efforts to cement and expand the mutual recognition of qualifications.

The commitments on facilitating co-operation on the digitisation of trade itself is a welcome step to making trade easier between the UK and GCC. Similarly, the commitment to collaborate on telecoms, including on Future Telecoms, is a welcome signal to businesses that they should engage in collaboration with GCC countries. We hope future negotiations expand the list of advanced technology cooperation with the Gulf states.

Overall, the Deal represents a solid foundation for expanding market access for UK service providers in the Gulf, a foundation which the UK and GCC can build upon through further trade liberalisation negotiations.

The UK must now also work to ensure companies use the Deal, and UK Government prioritise ensuring enforcement of the provisions on data localisation to reassure businesses that the Deal will be followed. As part of this, the UK should examine negotiating DTAs with individual GCC states that have shown a greater ambition and willingness to go further in negotiations, such as the UAE, and to provide greater certainty around data flows between the UK and specific GCC members.

Find out more

techUK will be responding by expanding our coverage of the GCC. Members should sign up to the International Technology Policy & Trade Group to stay up to date with all of our trade work.

Otherwise, sign up to the International Trade Newsletter to stay up to date with our all of our work on the Gulf, and our international trade work generally.

techUK International Policy and Trade Programme activities

techUK supports members with their international trade plans and aspirations. We help members to understand market opportunities, tackle market access barriers, and build partnerships in their target market. Visit the programme page here.