Clifford Chance, Eversheds and Allen & Overy triumph at Middle East awards
Clifford Chance (CC), Eversheds and Allen & Overy (A&O) were the main law firm winners at the third annual Corporate Counsel Middle East Awards last night (15 May), which saw CC named International Law Firm of the Year, while the trio of UK firms grabbed the lion’s share of the team awards.
Dubai Group, Baker Hughes, regional telecoms operator du and Mastercard secured the in-house awards on the night, which saw more than 300 lawyers gather at the Westin Dubai Mina Seyahi hotel to celebrate the achievements of the region’s top lawyers.
The awards were jointly hosted by Legal Week and the Corporate Counsel Middle East Group, which is set to join forces with the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) to form the ACC’s Middle East arm.
CC and A&O both won two awards at the event, with CC adding Corporate Team of the Year to its International Firm of the Year award and A&O scooping Transportation, Energy and Infrastructure Team of the Year as well as the Banking, Finance and Restructuring award.
It was a particularly memorable night for Eversheds, which walked off with the Property and Construction, Litigation and Dispute Resolution and Commercial team awards after winning praise from the judges for the quality of its client feedback.
It was also a good night for Qatari law firm Al-Ansari & Associates, which won the Middle East Law Firm of the Year award, ending Al Tamimi’s monopoly of this category over the previous two years. Having launched in 2007, Al-Ansari has expanded off the back of Qatar’s emergence as an international financial and business centre.
The roster of law firm winners also included DLA Piper (CSR Award) and Simmons & Simmons (Innovation Award).
The top in-house awards went to Tamer Nassar, of Baker Hughes, who was named General Counsel of the Year, and regional telecoms heavyweight du, which won the Legal Department of the Year – Large Team award.
The Dubai Group’s legal team, winner of Legal Department of the Year – Small Team, was praised by the judging panel for its work securing Dubai Group’s $10bn (£6bn) restructuring, thereby “closing the chapter on Dubai’s past financial woes and re-launching it yet again onto the global stage”.
The night, which was hosted by the BBC’s legal correspondent, Clive Coleman, culminated in the Achievement Award, which went to Gibson Dunn & Crutcher for setting up a regular pro bono legal advice clinic in Dubai to advise on debt and immigration-related problems.
“The number of registrations to enter the awards exceeded all expectations, up over 33% on last year, and the competition to make it to even the shortlists was intense,” said Elias Hayek, vice president, legal, EAME division, of Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, who chaired the judging panel.
“This year’s winners have demonstrated exceptional achievement and show that in-house legal teams and their external advisers in the Middle East continue to drive growth and innovation, develop new partnerships and complete complex deals.”
Hayek has become the inaugural president of ACC Middle East following the CCME Group’s affiliation with the US-based ACC, which, with 33,000 members, is the world’s largest representative group for in-house lawyers.
Veta T Richardson, president and chief executive of the ACC, said: “One of the top priorities of our strategic plan is to grow the ACC’S international membership. That is because 81% of our members told us in a survey that it is important to them for the ACC to be able to connect them with other in-house lawyers across the world.
Source: legalweek
