Allen & Overy Launches Riyadh Office Ahead Of Merger With Shearman & Sterling
With Saudi Arabia becoming increasingly significant for clients, one of the world’s top law firms, Allen & Overy has reinforced
Allen & Overy Launches Riyadh Office Ahead Of Merger With Shearman & Sterling
It has 4,000 lawyers globally and $3.5bn revenue in the region
With Saudi Arabia becoming increasingly significant for clients, one of the world’s top law firms, Allen & Overy has reinforced its Middle East presence by launching an office in Riyadh. The new space is the firm’s third in the region after Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
The move comes ahead of the firm’s merger with Shearman & Sterling on 01 May. It follows changes to Saudi Arabia’s Code of Law Practice that came into effect in 2023, wherein a law firm no longer had to operate in association with a local firm.
Previously, Allen & Overy operated in the Kingdom through association with local firm Khoshaim & Associates. However, the arrangement ended in 2020, when it decided to work with a ‘broader range of law firms’ to meet the growing demands of the clients.
While commenting on the development, Wim Dejonghe, the senior partner at Allen and Overy stated, “The office in Riyadh is a natural extension of our long-standing presence in the Middle East. This investment reflects our confidence in the growth potential in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and we are proud to partner with Hosam Ibn Ghaith and Haris Meyer Hanif, both leading lawyers who are well-known to many of our key clients in the region, and soon with Dr. Sultan Almasoud and his team.”
The firm’s on-the-ground Riyadh team includes corporate and commercial partners Hosam Ibn Ghaith and Haris Meyer Hanif, who re-joined early this year after over a decade as head of finance for the MENA region at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer.
Following the merger, they will be joined by Shearman’s Riyadh team, led by M&A and capital markets specialist Dr. Sultan Almasoud. The team also includes M&A partner Mohsin Suleman and an associate.
Ibn Ghaith joined the firm in November last, after six years as general counsel for Hassana Investment Company, the investment manager of Saudi Arabia’s social security and pension fund. Before that, he practiced at Khoshaim & Associates and Allen & Overy’s earlier Saudi associate firm, Abdulaziz AlGasim Law Firm.
For 15 years, he advised Saudi and multinational companies and government institutions on complex, high-value transactions. His major achievements include guiding Dussur, the Saudi government’s industrial investments company, on a joint venture with General Electric to build gas turbines in the Kingdom and acting for the Saudi Arabian Football Federation on its landmark broadcasting deal with the MBC Group.
Meyer Hanif is recognized as a leading restructuring and insolvency lawyer in the region. He specializes in leveraged and acquisition financings and private capital transactions across the Middle East and Africa. He will work alongside Dubai-based partner Adam Banks to establish a bench of restructuring and capital solutions specialists covering the Middle East.