Squire Patton Boggs has bolstered its corporate offering in Dubai with the hire of a partner from Baker McKenzie. 

Omar Momany has joined the 1500-lawyer firm after eight years at Baker McKenzie, where he led the UAE corporate/M&A practice. He has practised in the region for more than 20 years and focuses on public and private M&A, corporate restructurings, corporate governance, joint ventures, commercial matters and corporate/shareholders’ disputes. 

“Our Middle East practice is a critical part of our firm’s global offering and we are committed to growing with practitioners who share our ambition for the region’s future,” said Middle East practice co-chair and global board member Gassan Baloul. “Omar is recognised as one of the region’s leading corporate lawyers and will play a key role in our expansion efforts in the years ahead.”

Balould told Bloomberg that despite the downturn in the global deals market Squire’s corporate team “has more work than we can handle” and that alongside Momany would be hiring junior associates in Dubai to help with the workload. 

The MENA region generated a total of 318 M&A deals amounting to $43.8bn in the first half of 2023, according to data from EY, with most of that – $42.5bn – being generated in the GCC region. 

Momany’s hire follows Squire securing financial services partner Nima Fath in Dubai in May from Jones Day, where she had headed the financial markets practice for the Middle East. 

Earlier in the year the firm, which has 25 lawyers in the UAE, also announced it had formed a cooperation agreement with the Law Office of Looaye M. Al-Akkas in Saudi Arabia, after ending an affiliation with Riyadh-based Khalid Al-Thebity Law Firm. 

The move followed the introduction of new laws in the Kingdom that forbade non-Saudi law firms from operating through affiliations with Saudi practices and compelled them to operate there directly, either in a joint venture with registered Saudi lawyers as co-shareholders, or as a branch office of a foreign law firm. 

Squire made $1.16bn in global revenue last year, according to data from the American Lawyer. It currently has 42 offices in 21 countries.

Momany’s departure from Baker McKenzie follows the firm parting ways last year with Dr Habib Al Mulla, executive chairman of its UAE arm and name partner of Habib Al Mulla & Partners, which retained its branding when the two parties agreed to merge in 2013, after he made anti-gay comments on Twitter. 

Bakers also announced today that it has moved its Dubai office to a new space in the Dubai International Finance Centre and hired Adil Hussain from Clyde & Co to head its UAE banking and finance practice. Hussain, who will also serve as global head of Islamic finance, has joined the firm after nine years at Clydes.