About

UAE Trading Group introduced high-end clothing to the UAE in 1972 and incorporated an affiliate company in Lebanon (Luxury Clothing Company) in 2008 and now has over 78 stores featuring world class luxury brands. In 2011, Zeina Abillamah joined the Dubai office as the Group’s first legal counsel and gradually put in place company policies and established the legal department in 2014, which currently includes a team of three fully qualified lawyers with a fourth member to join in late 2018. She also gained a seat on the board of directors allowing her to participate in business decisions and completed a major restructuring project for the Group in 2017.

Dianne Baldoza, joined the legal department in October 2014 as a legal coordinator and, having demonstrated various competences, she was promoted to legal counsel in January 2017 and now mainly handles franchising and compliance matters. Sarkis Belian joined in February 2017 with previous experience attained in the banking world where he used to conduct his work in Arabic; however, he has demonstrated a strong ability to adapt to and excel in a completely new sector governed by a different set of rules and steered in a different language. He now mainly handles leasing and legal public relation matters for the Group. Abillamah says that Baldoza and Belian ‘are both great assets to the team, each with his/her “secret sauce” [and] I am proud to be working with such hardworking, dedicated, successful colleagues’. Because assigning one framed role per legal counsel would limit the latter’s horizons while it would not be practical for such counsel to manage everything at once, Zeine says that she makes sure that, although each member of the team focuses on specific areas, all of the team are aware of every single legal matter and weekly detailed team meeting guarantees each member stay abreast of all such matters.

The department does not use external software but monitors files through a simple tracker, developed by Baldoza, which is updated as developments occur. The team has recently introduced, in collaboration with the HR department, the Group’s new code of conduct which was a fundamental building block of the new simplified structure. In addition, the team has successfully completed multiple new deals besides amicable settlements. It always adopts a business-driven approach which aims at duly protecting the company’s rights and interests while ensuring commercial viability of their advice which helps in determining the business strategy. The team also gets involved in the Group’s business procedures which facilitates the issuance of advice,which is often commercial advice within legal boundaries. Over the past years, the retail market has incurred a downwards trend due to many geopolitical factors and the exponential growth of the e-commerce business so the team always makes sure it understands the business and market needs by leveraging the department’s diverse expertise and working as true business partners.