Thumbay Group: Three decades of transforming healthcare and education

Thumbay Group, founded in 1997 by Dr Thumbay Moideen, enters its 30th year in the UAE, marking nearly three decades of growth from a pioneering medical education initiative into a diversified academic healthcare group, headquartered in Dubai.

The journey began when Dr Moideen was invited by the ruling family of Ajman to establish a private medical college, an unprecedented opportunity for an expatriate at the time. Gulf Medical College opened in 1998 and has since evolved into Gulf Medical University (GMU). Today, GMU is recognised as the No. 1 private medical university in the Gulf.

GMU has seven colleges, more than 50 accredited programmes, around 5,000 students from over 111 nationalities, and academic and research collaborations with more than 70 international universities and institutions. The group invests approximately Dh10 million annually in research grants.

Thumbay Group’s healthcare network has grown into one of the region’s largest private academic healthcare systems, with academic hospitals, clinics, medical centres, diagnostic laboratories and pharmacies. Its facilities have treated more than 19 million patients from 175 nationalities and conducted over 100,000 deliveries.

At the heart of this ecosystem is Thumbay Medicity in Al Jurf, Ajman, a 25-acre integrated healthcare and education destination featuring the 350-bed Thumbay University Hospital, the region’s largest private academic hospital, along with Thumbay Dental Hospital and Thumbay Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Hospital. The integrated facility receives around 15,000 visitors daily.

The group is continuing to expand its academic healthcare footprint. Over the past year, foundation stones were laid for a 120-bed psychiatric and rehabilitation hospital at Sharjah Healthcare City, the Thumbay Veterinary Teaching Hospital and Thumbay College of Veterinary Medicine at Thumbay Medicity, and the Thumbay International Research Centre, which will house the university’s research programmes and the Thumbay Research Institute for Precision Medicine. Thumbay Medicity Dubai is the next major project in the pipeline and is expected to create around 1,000 jobs. The group has also announced the UAE’s first academic programme in longevity medicine in partnership with Switzerland’s Geneva College of Longevity Science.

“What we started in 1997 is now an iconic company in the UAE,” says Dr Thumbay Moideen, Founder President, Thumbay Group.

Thumbay Group aims to build the world’s largest network of medical education centres, driven by its guiding philosophy: Growth through innovation.