Badri and Salim El Meouchi LLP

The firm: Badri and Salim El Meouchi Law Firm is a regional law firm with a strong reputation for providing outstanding, innovative legal advice that bridges the gap between Middle Eastern legal systems and their western counterparts.

The 130-year-old law firm recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of its Doha office – although the firm has been active in Qatar since the early 1980s, making the Qatar Financial Centre a natural choice for its first office outside of Beirut, in 2006.

The Doha office, which also serves North Africa and Asia, is most active in corporate, commercial, banking, finance (both conventional and Islamic), real estate, industrial, litigation, alternative dispute resolution and arbitration, IP, telecom, technology and oil and gas law.

Badri and Salim El Meouchi Law Firm strongly believes in the importance of community, and devotes thousands of hours a year to charitable and not-for-profit initiatives in the fields of human rights, education, special needs, the fight against poverty, and the promotion of leadership and entrepreneurship in the Middle East. The Doha team is particularly active in leadership education for young Qataris in high-schools across Doha.

Badri and Salim El Meouchi Law Firm also works hand-in-hand with governments, regulatory bodies and NGOs to improve and modernise the legal frameworks in the Middle East.

With its diverse range of experts, local knowledge and in-depth understanding of the law, Badri and Salim El Meouchi Law Firm aims to provide its client with a full range of services to support their business expansion in the MENA region.

Areas of practice: Badri and Salim El Meouchi Law Firm’s attorneys can assist clients in the following fields:

Corporate/commercial: advising on corporate structures and agreements for all parts of the life-cycle of a company, from startup, family, SMEs to multinationals, and from mergers and acquisitions through to funding and IPO.

Banking/finance/insurance (conventional and Islamic): advising on a wide range of financial structures and products. The firm’s clients in this field include banks, financial institutions and investors (both institutional and HNWI).

Litigation: active in this field since its foundation, the firm is known for seeking and obtaining the best possible outcome for its clients.

Arbitration/ADR: the firm was an early pioneer in arbitration and ADR in the Middle East, and frequently acts as counsel or arbitrator in major regional and international arbitrations, both institutional and ad hoc. The firm is renowned for its pre-conflict work, seeking to avoid conflict and laying the groundwork for successful litigation should ADR fail.

Taxation: advising on tax-efficient structuring, including cross-border structures in conjunction with advisors in the requisite jurisdictions.

Funds: structuring and setting up funds in various sectors.

Real estate: advising on all aspects of real estate development, from purchase, construction, operation and disposal.

Industrial: advising on industrial operations, including ownership, management and licensing.

Healthcare: advising and representing pharmaceuticals, hospitals and foundations in healthcare.

Hospitality/F&B: advising hotel operators and managers, franchisors and franchisees, on all legal aspects of their business and transactions.

FMCG: advising clients on manufacturing, distribution and brand protection in the MENA, including combatting counterfeiting and enforcement.

IP: advising on and registering trade marks and patents throughout the Middle East.

IT/technology: advising on legal issues faced by technology companies and web and mobile businesses, including an expertise in startup financing.

Telecommunications: advising operators and equipment manufacturers on telecommunications issues in the Middle East.

Oil and gas: advising oil and gas firms for both upstream and downstream.