Dubai

Our Dubai office provides legal advice on all aspects of business law, including construction, corporate, commercial, dispute resolution, corporate governance, employment, energy, finance & financial services, information technology & media, intellectual property and real estate.

We have strong connections in Dubai and the Middle East and regularly work with:

• SMEs and all forms of business entity, including sole proprietors, FZEs, LLCs and Branch offices;
• High-Net-Worth individuals;
• High-Net-Worth local merchant families and their corporate groups;
• Middle Eastern financial institutions; and
• International financial institutions doing business in the Gulf.

Taylor Wessing can offer your business: 

• Access to a local and global network across the Middle East, Asia and Europe;
• Over 15 years of experience in the Middle East;
• Experience across a wide range of sectors; and
• Lawyers who speak a number of languages including Arabic, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Urdu, Romanian and Afrikaans.

15 years in the Middle East

We applaud the progress of UAE legal system over the last 15 years and the new legal structures that will support future industries of national interest. 

We believe there are four major legislative changes that have helped make the UAE very attractive to foreign investors and these legal milestones also make the UAE the most developed legal system within the Middle East.

1. The expansion of the JAFZA free zone model to other designated areas across the UAE has permitted foreigners to establish 100 per cent foreign-owned entities in increasing numbers.
2. Introducing freehold title for foreigners in 2006 led to expatriates investing more of their time and money in the UAE. 
3. The creation of the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) in 2004. This introduced to the country a new legal regime based on Western common law systems.
4. The expansion of the DIFC courts to adjudicate disputes between parties not registered in the DIFC, subject to mutual agreement, means businesses now have the choice to have their cases heard in Arabic or English, using civil or common law.

We are proud to have worked in the UAE for 15 years and to have been part of the developing the region. 

• We assisted the Legal Affairs Department in the drafting of a Maritime Code for Dubai.
• We were the first investment structure under the DIFC’s new Collective Investment Funds regime, enacted in 2010, and;
• The first law firm to arrange registration of a pledge over company shares at the Dubai Department of Economic Development as a recognised form of security interest.

For more information about these services, please visit our Middle East page.

Map of our office location