Star Drones: How an Omani Startup Landed a Bangladesh Tech Deal

A small Omani drone and artificial intelligence company based at Innovation Park Muscat has found itself at the center of government-to-government talks between the Sultanate of Oman and Bangladesh. Over the past two weeks, officials from both countries have discussed cooperation on AI platforms, biotechnology, drone manufacturing, and semiconductor design, with Star Drones and its CEO acting as the Omani private-sector face of the discussions.

According to Arab News, Bangladesh is actively seeking a partnership with Oman to develop its AI and biotech sectors, building on a bilateral meeting held in Dhaka on July 30, 2026, that brought together senior Bangladeshi science officials and Star Drones' leadership.

Key Takeaways

• Bangladesh's Science and Technology Secretary met Star Drones' CEO in Dhaka to explore AI, biotech, and drone cooperation
• Star Drones is the Omani firm behind TARIQ, the Sultanate's first fully domestically manufactured drone
• Talks cover AI platforms, semiconductor design, robotics, and even agricultural biotech like salt-tolerant rice
• A separate MoU with Bangladeshi software firm Brain Station 23 could open tech jobs for engineers in Oman
• The deal reflects Oman Vision 2040's push to turn local innovation into an exportable, revenue-generating industry

🤝 A Dhaka Meeting With Sultanate-Wide Implications

The bilateral discussion took place at Bangladesh's Secretariat in Dhaka on July 30, 2026, and was reported in detail by BSS News and Arab News in the days since. The Bangladeshi delegation was led by Science and Technology Secretary Md. Anwar Hossain, joined by Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (BCSIR) Chairman Dr. Samina Ahmed and Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Dr. M. Moinul Islam.

Representing Oman were Star Drones CEO Said Abdul Ghafoor Saif Udeen and the company's Chief Technology Officer, Bassim Allah Bakhsh Ghulam Al-Zadjali, alongside Fathiya Ahmed Al-Balushi, Deputy Head of Mission at the Omani Embassy in Dhaka. Ashraful Haque Chowdhury, President of the Saudi Arabia-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry, also took part, underlining the regional business dimension of the talks.

Hossain also framed the relationship in terms of complementary strengths, noting that as Arab News reported, "Oman has the capacity to adopt and scale advanced technologies quickly... Bangladesh has a massive, talented youth population." Chowdhury added that "Oman is treated as a business hub gateway for Middle Eastern, GCC countries," a framing that positions the Sultanate as a launchpad for Bangladeshi firms eyeing the wider Gulf.

🛸 Who Is Star Drones?

Star Drones is not a household name in Oman's startup scene the way Rihal or Byanat have become, but it has quietly built a reputation as an R&D-driven engineering company. Founded in 2022 and headquartered at Innovation Park Muscat in Al Khoudh, near Sultan Qaboos University, the firm describes itself first as a research house and second as a drone manufacturer, with AI woven through both.

At COMEX 2024, Star Drones unveiled TARIQ, described by Oman Observer as the first drone fully designed and manufactured by Omani hands. The aircraft uses a modular design, AI-driven navigation, and body panels made from Omani algae-based 3D printing filaments developed with local materials firm Plamore.

The company's commercial work today spans agricultural pesticide spraying, industrial inspection, aerial imaging, and drone maintenance training, giving it practical, revenue-generating operations rather than a purely research profile. That combination, a working local product plus deep AI and R&D capability, appears to be exactly what caught Bangladesh's attention.

📋 What's Actually Being Discussed

The scope of the Dhaka talks, as detailed by BSS News, went well beyond drones. Topics on the table included:

• Artificial intelligence platforms and national AI infrastructure
• Drone technology, agricultural technology, and semiconductor design
• Robotics and startup funding mechanisms
• Biotechnology, including salt-tolerant and diabetes-friendly rice varieties
• Food processing and preservation technology, and pest control research targeting the Red Palm Weevil, a threat to date palms across Oman and the Gulf

Bangladesh's interest is partly structural. The country produces more than 40,000 STEM graduates a year, according to Arab News, and is looking to convert that talent pool into exportable technical services and joint ventures, including plans for a domestic biotech park and a national AI platform. Oman, by contrast, has capital and an appetite to scale technology quickly but a comparatively small workforce, a gap Bangladeshi officials were explicit about wanting to fill.

As next steps, the two sides agreed to exchange visits between researchers and entrepreneurs at each country's science parks, and Oman has been invited to take part in Bangladesh's National Innovation Fair in September 2026. Both governments also agreed to designate focal points to keep the coordination moving, a modest but concrete follow-up mechanism rather than a vague statement of intent.

💼 A Separate Deal Already Signed

While the government-level talks are still exploratory, one piece of this cooperation has already moved from discussion to paper. Dhaka-based software firm Brain Station 23 signed a memorandum of understanding with Star Drones covering drone technology, software engineering, and robotics, according to Arab News. Under the agreement, Brain Station 23 will supply engineering talent to support Star Drones' software development for agricultural and industrial drone applications, with work delivered primarily remotely but with provisions for engineers to be deployed on-site in Oman.

For Oman, this is a small but tangible example of the country importing specialized engineering capacity rather than finished products, a model that fits neatly with the Sultanate's own effort to grow homegrown tech capability. Local support schemes such as the RO 1 million Sas for Excellence initiative for Omani tech companies already point in a similar direction: build domestic capacity, then use it as leverage in international partnerships rather than simply buying technology off the shelf.

🎯 Where This Fits Into Vision 2040

Oman Vision 2040 is built around diversifying the economy away from hydrocarbons and turning knowledge, innovation, and digital services into genuine export sectors, not just tools for domestic efficiency. A homegrown drone and AI company being courted by a foreign government for its expertise, rather than the other way around, is a small but symbolically useful data point for that ambition.

It also lines up with a broader pattern of quieter Vision 2040 progress that often gets less attention than headline mega-projects, something explored in omanvision2040.com's recent look at Oman's under-the-radar wins. A Muscat startup shaping technology cooperation with a country of 170 million people is exactly the kind of development that rarely makes front-page news domestically but matters for the Sultanate's long-term positioning as a technology exporter rather than purely an importer.

📈 What It Means for Oman's Startup Ecosystem

The direct economic impact of these talks is still modest and largely prospective: no investment figures or firm job numbers have been disclosed, and much of the cooperation remains at the memorandum and exploratory-visit stage. But the signal value for Oman's startup ecosystem is meaningful for a few reasons:

• It shows an Omani company with genuine in-house R&D, not just a reseller of imported hardware, can be the counterparty in state-level technology diplomacy.
• It opens a channel for Bangladeshi engineering talent to support Omani firms without requiring those firms to relocate operations abroad.
• It gives Star Drones a credible international reference point beyond Oman and the wider Gulf, useful for future fundraising or expansion conversations.

For context on how far Oman's private tech sector has already come in attracting outside capital and attention, it is worth comparing this government-brokered opening with startups that have grown through direct investment, such as the trajectory covered in AI in Oman's coverage of state support for local tech firms. Star Drones represents a different pathway: international demand pulling an Omani company outward, rather than domestic funding pushing it forward.

🇴🇲 Why This Matters for Oman

Most Oman-Bangladesh technology headlines to date have focused on the flow of skilled labor into the Gulf. This story runs in a less common direction: an Omani company's technology and expertise being sought out by a government eager to build its own AI and biotech capacity. Nothing here is a signed, multi-million-dollar investment yet, and the initiative could easily stall at the memorandum stage if follow-through lags, a fair caveat given how early these talks still are.

But even at this exploratory stage, it is a useful marker for Muscat's Vision 2040 ambitions: a locally built drone using Omani-developed materials and AI navigation, coming out of a technology park near Sultan Qaboos University, is now part of a bilateral conversation about semiconductors, biotech parks, and national AI platforms thousands of kilometers away. That is precisely the kind of soft-power, knowledge-economy story Oman has been trying to write for itself.