Samantha Shaw
Biography
Overview
Samantha is an associate in the Dubai office, supporting our Real Estate team. She acts for a variety of corporate and government clients (including developers) in relation to their complex and technical real estate and project financing matters, with a focus on major commercial leasing, property development, land access agreements and sale contracts. Samantha has acted on a variety of property matters including industrial, retail and commercial leasing, property acquisitions and disposals (including distressed asset sales), property-related insolvency matters and energy and resources land tenure issues.
Prior to joining White & Case, Samantha was an Associate in the Real Estate practice of an international law firm, based in the Middle East, where she advised clients on the management and leasing of real estate investments, development leasing, real estate aspects of corporate transactions, property finance and renewable energy projects. She also served as a secondee at the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation.
Experience
Representative examples of our experience include:
- Advising an owner on its hotel Franchise Agreement with an international hotel operator for the operation of a hotel in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia;
- Advising one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds in its divestment of assets in Abu Dhabi for development as mixed use towers by way of long term development leases to foreign investors;
- Advising one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds in preparing, negotiating and finalising leases for the four A-grade office towers that make up Abu Dhabi Global Market Square (a free zone in the UAE) to a variety of tenants including key government entities, international and UAE financial institutions and investors and prominent professional firms.
- Advising large international banks including HSBC and Credit Suisse on corporate occupation matters in the region, including HSBC's build-to-suit development of new headquarters in Emaar Square (advising on inspection, snagging, handover and additional works issues) and Credit Suisse's offices in DIFC and Bahrain.
- Advising Emirates NBD (a major regional financial institution) on the financing of a prestigious mixed-use development by master developer and free zone authority, Dubai Multi Commodities Centre. My role included undertaking due diligence on the real estate assets, advising on the security package and assisting with taking security over the real estate assets.
- Advising Nakheel, one of the largest regional master developers, on the structured titling and hotel branding arrangements for its new mixed-use project on the Palm (a large man-made master community in the ocean).
