Hogan Lovells has hired the head of Eversheds Sutherlands’ M&A practice in Saudi Arabia, Walid Salib, amid a surge in global deal values fuelled by sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia.
Salib has joined the firm after two years as a partner at Eversheds, before which he was head of the Saudi M&A practice at Freshfields. He has more than 14 years of experience in the Middle East, with a track record of advising private equity houses, sovereign wealth funds, family offices and multinational corporations on complex M&A transactions.
“Walid has strong relationships across the private and public sectors and his arrival is an important step in delivering on our focused growth strategy,” said Georgy Kalashnikov, who heads up the Middle East region at Hogan Lovells. “We’re committed to investing in the kingdom, one of the fastest growing economies in the G20. By continuing to invest in our Riyadh office, we are strengthening our ability to support clients on their most complex mandates in the Middle East and internationally.”
Salib’s practice covers public and private M&A, strategic joint ventures, corporate structuring and restructuring, capital markets-related M&A and obtaining Saudi merger control clearances.
He will be Hogan Lovells’ third partner based in Riyadh, working alongside office managing partner Turki Alsheikh – a corporate and finance lawyer – and projects and infrastructure partner Jeremy Brittenden.
Alsheikh said Salib’s practice “complements our existing offering and his skillset aligns with our strengths”, adding his hire furthered the firm’s goal to be recognised as a global elite firm in the Saudi market.
Hogan Lovells has had a presence in Saudi Arabia through alliances with local firms since 2009, and opened an independent office there early last year after the kingdom changed its code of law practice to enable foreign firms to set up their own practices without the constraints of a local partner. The change came with a number of conditions, including that 70% of a firm’s lawyers must be Saudi nationals.
Dozens of leading US and UK law firms have opened offices in the kingdom or applied to do so since the rule changes, as the kingdom becomes increasingly important for clients. The Saudi government’s Vision 2030 project to diversify its economy away from dependency on oil has seen it launch $1.3trn in real estate and infrastructure projects alone over the past eight years, Bloomberg reported.
Salib’s move to Hogan Lovells follows the value of global deal making hitting $3trn in the first three quarters of 2025, 33% up on the previous year and the best first three quarters since 2021.
Deep-pocketed Middle Eastern and Asian sovereign wealth funds have fuelled the resurgence, Bloomberg reported, providing the financial firepower for large-scale transactions. Landmark deals have included the $55bn acquisition of Electronic Arts by a consortium of investors that included Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, the largest take-private investment in history.
In October BlackRock partnered with MGX, an AI firm backed by Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company, in a $40bn deal to acquire Aligned Data Centers.
Email your news and story ideas to: [email protected]
