HFI opens its doors in Qatar

HFI was established and licensed by the Qatar Financial Centre Authority to operate from the Qatar Financial Centre (QFC) in late 2007, and is able to operate as a provider of a full range of legal and commercial services in Qatar.

With a wealth of knowledge and practical experience, HFI, headquartered in Aberdeen, Scotland, offers advice and support in the legal and commercial domain including; regulatory issues; establishing a company; joint participation ventures; representative and branches offices; Qatari laws; foreign capital investments; QFC laws; tax law; company law; commercial agencies law and labour law.

The solid team in the Qatar office boasts multinational experience and has extensive knowledge of dispute resolution, conciliation, mediation, arbitration and local and international litigation and can offer guidance to each individual client throughout the decision making and implementation process, offering specific legal advice in the context of the particular circumstances.

Responsibility for the HFI Legal Qatar office, which will serve the West Gulf region, will be with newly appointed Russian lawyer Ildar Baybekov, who joined as a Partner in October 2007. British lawyers Adam Omer and Maureen Kelly join Baybekov. Omer joins HFI as a Specialist Legal Consultant and Kelly joins the team as an Associate specialising in intellectual property law. Marina Hallam who joined HFI in August, is managing the business administration function.

Ildar Baybekov said "I am delighted that HFI Qatar is now firmly in place. With 15% of the world's gas reserves in Qatar and with major gas, oil, petrochemicals and infrastructure projects planned and underway we are all very excited by the Qatar market. Our Qatar operations mark a major expansion of both our legal consultancy, Hugh Fraser International Legal Consultancy and our business consultancy, HFI Ventures International, and I am looking forward to the exciting challenges ahead with our new team."

The HFI Qatar team will initially be based in the Gridco Building, C-Ring Road, Doha pending the completion and opening of our new offices in Al Fardan Business Tower in the West Bay Business District of Doha, which is scheduled for opening in early 2008.