Marwa Ali Bamatraf

Ms. Bamatraf regularly advises international and local companies such as Qatar Rail, QatarEnergy (QE), Uber, FIFA, Ministry of Finance and several international and governmental entities in connection to civil, corporate, regulatory and commercial matters. Her experience includes dealing and advising on capital markets (QFMA and QE) and governance of various forms of companies. This includes establishment and conversion of companies to private shareholding and public shareholding companies such as Baladna and QAMCO. She also acted as the Qatari law counsel for the bond issuance of the Ministry of Finance on 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 in addition to advising the Managers in the QE bond issuance. She also advised Qatar Airways on their bond issuance and the Ministry of Finance as guarantor. Her experience also includes drafting Qatari laws, Executive Regulations, and Ministerial Decisions.

In addition to her experience in commercial matters, she has experience in dealing and advising on capital market (including QFMA and QE regulations), governance of various forms of companies and has extensive experience in labour and civil laws.

Experience:

• – Advised the State of Qatar, acting through the Ministry of Finance, on annual issuance of bonds; including reviewing and drafting prospectus, due diligence and transactional documents on a USD 12,000,000,000 international bond issuance for five years.
• – Successfully represented and advised Uber against the Competition and Anti-Monopoly Committee in Qatar on anti-trust and competition dispute in connection with the Uber’s acquisition of Careem. This included representing Uber in a litigation case before the Qatari Courts due to the Committee’s rejection of the said acquisition. The claim was successful, and the award came to Uber’s favor; revoking the Committee’s rejection decision.
• – Acting and advising Pierre Balmain in global trademark, brand protection, intellectual property enforcement, licensing and anti-counterfeiting matters.
• – Represented FIFA in assessing FIFA’s requirements against the current applicable laws in the State of Qatar to host the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 and provided the organization with a draft enabling legislation in order to effect the changes necessary to host said competition.
• – Represented and advised the principle Public Healthcare Provider in Qatar and one of the leading hospitals in the Middle-East. This included drafting different types of agreements related to procuring services that optimize the existing IT solutions across all the existing public hospitals, expanding the existing IT solutions to newly built public hospitals/health centers, and overseeing a technology refresh under currently managed services, which would include the procurement of new hardware infrastructure, commissioning, implementation of hardware/software, hosting, and providing maintenance services valued at QAR 600,000,000.
• – Acting as the Qatari law counsel in establishing a Public Shareholding Company owned by QE (QAMCO) including advising on the structure, reviewing the prospectus, and drafting the establishment documents (Capital of QAR 1,000,000,000).
• – Advising Mazaya Real Estate Development, MilahaQatar Navigation and other Qatari Public Shareholding Company on corporate governance and regularly providing legal opinions on different aspects of law.
• – Restructured a branch of a Canadian college to a Qatari University as well as drafted and advised on the constitutional documents and agreements between the Canadian University and the Government of Qatar.
• – Advised on Qatar Pharma IPO.
• – Advised on Baladna IPO.
• – Conducted a due diligence report for Qatar Investment Authority on a transfer of assets valued at QAR 6.7 Billion.
• – Acted as the Qatari Counsel to Qatar Airways Group Q.C.S.C in connection with the issuance of $510,000,000 and $490,000,000 Trust Certificates and acted as the local counsel to the Ministry of Finance as the guarantor in $1,000,000,000. The transaction included drafting an Emiri Decree to the Ministry of Finance, drafting Ministerial Resolutions, and drafting and reviewing condition precedents including all required authorisations and delegations to effect the transaction by the Ministry of Finance and Qatar Airways.
• – Drafted two Emiri decrees in relation to the issuance of bonds and the establishment of a state-owned college.
• – Drafted and reviewed a Facility Agreement as per the Islamic finance (Murabaha Agreement) for QAR 2,200,000,000.
• – Restructured a Private Qatari Shareholding Company (a bank under QFC) to a Limited Liability Company.
• – Advised Qatar Railways Company on all litigations in the Qatari Courts.
• – Drafted two laws and one executive regulation for Qatar Railways Company.
• – Advised on the conversion of three limited liability companies to private shareholding holding companies.