The Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre in the United Arab Emirates will launch its satellite atop Russia’s Soyuz-2 carrier rocket, the Government of Dubai Media Office said on Tuesday.

"On June 27th at 3:34 p.m. UAE time [2:34 Moscow time], MBR Space Centre will launch its maiden mission, PHI-Demo, from Russia's Vostochny Cosmodrome using the Soyuz-2 rocket as part of the Payload Hosting Initiative," the media office said in a statement.

The statement says that the initiative, jointly led by MBRSC and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), is aimed at providing space access and hastening the sustainable progression of novel space technologies.

The WAM news agency reported that the satellite would include IoT (Internet of Things) equipment, developed by OQ Technology, a UAE-based start-up under MBRSC's Space Ventures initiative. It will employ the 5G mobile communications technology to store and forward data collected from IoT devices in remote locations, as well from IoT equipment used in various industries and in autonomous vehicles. The satellite also features a "green and safe propulsion subsystem" that uses water as the primary propellant. It was developed by SteamJet, a company from the United Kingdom.

According to the Russian government’s decree dated June 2, 2023, the PHI-Demo spacecraft will be launched as a hitchhiker payload during the orbiting of Russia’s Meteor-M 2-3 hydrometeorological satellite.