Thuraya is a regional satellite phone provider. Its coverage area is most of Europe, the Middle East, North, Central and East Africa, Asia and Australia.
The company is based in the United Arab Emirates and distributes its products and service through authorized service providers. Its shareholders are a mixture of Middle Eastern and North African telcos (in which Etisalat is a major one) and investment companies.
The current number of subscribers is around 250,000 (March 2006). Some 360,000 Thuraya handsets have been put in service since launch in 2001. The subscriber growth has apparently slowed down during the last year, but Thuraya still made a net profit of US$ 80 million on revenues of US$ 323 million in 2005 (compared to just US$ 26 million profit in 2004).
In spring 2008 Thuraya introduced Thuraya Marine: a combination of a fixed telephone unit and special contract. On the central unit a POTS phone, a fax and PC can be connected. The unit also has an emergency-button (and interface for remote switch) that will send several SMS messages to user defined destinations informing the receiver about the position of the craft.