Power International Holding, the Qatari conglomerate that grew to touch nearly every aspect of daily life in the run-up to the 2022 men’s soccer World Cup, has made the pivot few analysts would have predicted for a contractor: expanding beyond its domestic market after Qatar’s sports-centered infrastructure boom ended.

The company — whose interests span agriculture, construction, dairy, healthcare, hospitality, telecommunications, and real estate — has emerged as one of the largest investors in Kazakhstan, with interests in Algeria and plans to expand to Ethiopia. One of its biggest bets is Syria, where the Al-Khayyat family originated. Since the toppling of the Assad regime, PIH has won agriculture, aviation, energy, and tourism projects in the country.

Its work on a new terminal at Damascus airport is underway, with the exterior largely complete. The existing facility is a relic of communist-era architecture worn down by decades of neglect.

What distinguishes PIH’s approach is the other tools it brings, in addition to construction expertise: The company is using its access to capital and other networks to ensure there are planes to use the new terminal, providing $250 million in financing for Syrian Airlines to acquire up to 10 Airbus A320 aircraft, according to Chairman and Group CEO Ramez Al-Khayyat.

“Part of our contract is to have a certain amount of money available for them in order to buy the planes,” Al-Khayyat told Semafor in an interview in Doha. Building an airport designed to handle 31 million passengers a year does not work without aircraft, and Syrian Airlines has only a handful in operation. “We look at the whole ecosystem. This is our strength,” he said.

Conglomerates are often punished by public markets. This hasn’t deterred the Al-Khayyat family from pursuing the kind of vertical integration and empire-building associated with an earlier era. After leaving Syria at the start of the civil war, Ramez and his older brother Moutaz won government contracts in Qatar, starting with what they knew best — construction — and soon expanding into hospitals, hotels, restaurants, and entertainment venues. Most famously, they airlifted in thousands of cows to provide fresh milk after Saudi Arabia and the UAE imposed an embargo on Qatar in 2017.

As they worked on World Cup projects, it was clear that the Qatar government’s spending spree would not last beyond the tournament. What was once an almost exclusively Qatari enterprise began looking elsewhere, Al-Khayyat said. The company that emerged now operates in 25 countries.

Kazakhstan is its largest foreign market, with approximately $17 billion invested across telecoms, infrastructure, power generation, pipelines, and industrial projects. The Al-Khayyat family has also partnered with Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump on a resort in Albania, which has been the subject of local protests and controversy.