The tower's opening comes at a tough time for Dubai's economy. The city-state received a huge sum of money from its rich neighbor Abu Dhabi to help during the financially troubling times.

The tower's developer Emaar is not among the companies known to have received the infusion of cash.

Emaar says the entire Dubai tower project will cost 20 billion US dollars. Properties sales around the tower are meant to help the tower pay for itself, which analysts say is unlikely to be profitable on its own.

Saud Masud, Senior Analyst, Real Estate at UBS Investment Bank, said, "It puts Dubai on the map in a ironic way because the real estate housing downturn, is what is responsible for the current economic down cycle."

Analyst say during the peak housing market, some apartments in the building were selling for nearly 2 thousand US dollars per square foot. Now they are going for less than half that.

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