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Marat Davletbaev has joined Nektorov, Saveliev & Partners as head of the Department of International Law.

Davletbaev specializes in structuring complex corporate transactions, including the application of international law and the law of foreign jurisdictions, and also has experience in advising on business and human rights. He is a graduate of the international law department of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, and has attended the language school of Tamkang University in Taiwan. He speaks five languages: Russian, English, Chinese, French, and Italian.

Davletbaev has more than 10 years of experience, including as a partner at Threefold Legal Advisors, and as Head of Projects and the International Business Legal Department at Inter RAO UES, Deputy Head of the International Legal Department at VI Holding, and as Chief Legal Officer and Head of Section at Gazprom.

According to Alexander Nektorov, Davletbaev will help broaden the firm’s capabilities. “In connection with the rapid development of Nektorov, Saveliev & Partners and the growing number of projects in the field of corporate law, investment transactions, and M&A projects, adding a new partner this level is a strategically important decision for the company. This will allow us to be more responsive to the needs of clients, to accumulate the best solutions for business, and to strengthen our position in the legal services market.”

Image source: threefold.ru

Lakatos, Koves and Partners has provided a wide range of services to Flow Aviation, a recently established Hungarian private-jet services company.

According to the firm, it “has advised the company since its inception, [on] … all aspects of the company’s activity, from the initial establishment of the company to aircraft purchase and financing transactions and regulatory issues, such as obtaining necessary permits.

“This work is an exciting opportunity for us, assisting a start-up in a sophisticated service sector in which, from the outset, all the agreements must stand up to international norms and expectations,” said Szabolcs Mestyan, the Aviation Partner of the firm. “Our decade-long aviation experience helped the company to get up and fly.”

Integrites reports providing assistance to the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine in representing the state of Ukraine in the European Court of Human Rights in the “complex and delicate dispute with the Russian Federation.”

In doing so, the firm is cooperating with Jeremy McBride, “a leading barrister with broad international experience [and] the lawyer of the highest rank in Monckton Chambers” in London. According to Integrites, McBride has extensive experience in representing the interests of individuals and legal entities on the basis of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights and the Protocols thereto, as well as a wide range of other regional and international norms and mechanisms of human rights in the European court of Human Rights and other international judicial institutions.

In addition, Integrites has provided the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine with explanations and advice on the drafting of the statement of claim in the European Court of Human Rights, as well as being directly involved in the development of the argument made in the claim and the preparation of expert opinion in support of the applicability of Article 1 of Protocol number 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and much more.

Gide has announced that four senior lawyers have joined the firm in Budapest, including Senior Associate Franck Audran, who moves from Paris to co-head the Budapest office, and Balazs Kutasi, who takes over the office’s Dispute Resolution practice.

Audran worked for three years in Gide’s Bucharest office (which closed in February of 2014) prior to joining the Competition and International Trade practice in Gide Paris in 2010. 

Kutasi, who moved to Gide from Allen & Overy in September, specializes in civil and commercial litigation, as well as employment-related litigation. He started his career within the European Union Department of the Ministry of Justice of Hungary.

The firm also announced that Dasa Vukelic has joined the Budapest office from White & Case, and that Anna-Maria Veres joined the firm back in May of this year. Vukelic focuses on cross-border M&A and private equity matters in the SEE region, and Veres has experience advising international groups on complex M&A transactions, group restructurings, and corporate financing projects. She is dual-qualified in Hungarian and Romanian law.

Budapest Partner Akos Kovacs said: “We are delighted to welcome Franck, Anna-Maria, Dasa, and Balazs to our team. Their experience will fit in perfectly with our international expertise.” And Francois d’Ornano, the Partner in charge of Gide Budapest and the firm’s practice in South-East Europe, adds “The skill set of our new colleagues will help us to further develop our local knowledge and assist our clients in their investment projects in both Central and South-Eastern Europe.”

As CEE Legal Matters reported in June of this year, former Co-Managing Partner of Gide’s Budapest office Eszter Kamocsay-Berta left with several colleagues to launch a new boutique in Hungary.

Tark Grunte Sutkiene has advised Citycar on the sale of its 38.5% share in the Jazz Pesulad car wash chain.

According to the firm, Jazz Pesulad was founded in 2003, is based in Talinn, and “offers … an innovative and modern concept of car washing services.” Citycar — also founded in 2003 — focuses on the car dealership market and has its “main cooperation partners” in southern Germany.

Legal advice was provided by Tark Grunte Sutkiene Partner Risto Vahimets and Senior Associate Tanel Kuun.

Yuksel Karkin Kucuk and Gide Loyrette Nouel have won the Bonds & Loans Awards Project Finance Deal of the Year and Turkey Structured Finance Deal of the Year awards, respectively.

Yuksel Karkin Kucuk, the Turkish firm closely affiliated with DLA Piper until the two announced their “demerger” last week, has announced that the STAR (Socar Turcas Aegean Refinery) Project, on which the firm advised, was named Project Finance Deal of the Year by Bonds & Loans Awards, which the firm calls, “one of the most prestigious awards in the sector.” The STAR Project won two other awards as well: the Weber Shandwick Trade and Export Deal of the Year and Syndicated Loan Deal of the Year.  

SOCAR — the Azeri state oil company — secured financing for the USD 5.5 billion Turkish oil refinery it is building with Turcas Petrol in March, 2014. Sources at the time reported that the source of funding was provided by Turkey’s Denizbank, owned by Russia’s Sberbank. The Star plant in Aliaga on the Aegean coast is expected to have an annual capacity of 10 million tons. It will also produce diesel, jet fuel, and LPG. SOCAR owns 81.5 percent of the Aegean refinery project, with Turcas owning the remaining 18.5 percent.  

YukselKark?nKucuk provided legal advice to SOCAR on the project, which the firm describes as “the largest real sector financing in Turkey … targeted to achieve construction and operation of the second and the most productive oil refinery in Turkey tackling the significant supply gap in the domestic market.”  

Similarly, Gide Loyrette Nouel has announced that the European Export Credit Agency it arranged for Turkish Airlines has won the Bonds and Loans Awards Turkey Structured Finance Deal of the Year Award. 

According to a Gide press release, “this innovative deal successfully combined a Japanese Operating Lease with Call Option (JOLCO) with a European Credit Agencies’ (EECA) guaranteed bank debt (ECA JOLCO) structure. This structure affords tax advantages to the Japanese equity investors and offers credit enhancement to the lenders.” The firm elaborated that, “the arrangement of the cash flow structure in Japanese Yen allows the airline to naturally hedge its currency risk by matching its excess JPY revenues. The combination of the ECA guarantee, equity investment and JPY-denomination provides Turkish Airlines with a low cost of borrowing. The bulk of the payments are made towards the end of the tenor in a JOLCO structure providing Turkish Airlines with a liquidity advantage. This structure also provides a call option on the purchase of the aircraft on the 10th year. Not all airlines are eligible to enter the JOLCO market and this was a 100% LTV financing unlike most of the alternatives in the current aircraft financing market.”  

BNP Paribas acted as lead arranger and lender and Development Bank of Japan as a lender.

Divjak, Topic & Bahtijarevic has advised the Croatian state-owned provider of postal services, Croatian Post, on its EUR 52 million bond issuance on October 10, 2014. The Croatian Post has close to 10 thousand employees and conducts over 500 million transactions and services annually.

According to a Divjak, Topic & Bahtijarevic statement, the firm “undertook a thorough due diligence procedure, prepared both an information memorandum and prospectus for listing of bonds on the stock exchange, and supported the actual stock exchange listing.” The deal also, the firm reports, “included sophisticated refinancing of existing bonds.”

The DTB team was led by Partner Damir Topic, and coordinated by Senior Associate Martina Kalamiza. 

Hedman Partners has added Dmitri Tsimpoaka to the firm’s partnership, joining Kalle Pedak, Merlin Salvik, and Esa Halmari.

Tsimpoaka’s primary fields of expertise are commercial law, mergers and acquisitions, labor law, insolvency matters, and dispute resolution. He graduated from Tartu University’s Faculty of Law with a Master’s degree in 2010, and he has also studied commercial law at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam. Prior to joining Hedman Partners, Tsimpoaka four years ago, he served as a lawyer at the Juhkentali law office. He became a member of the Estonian Bar Association in 2012.

Hedman Partners’ Managing Partner Merlin Salvik said that Tsimpoaka established himself as a “very valuable commercial and employment law expert during the four years he has worked at the law firm, particularly excelling as an advisor to international M&A transactions and complicated labor disputes.” She explained that “inviting Dmitri to join the circle of partners is a clear statement of our trust and our commitment to share with him the joys and responsibilities of the law firm.”

Konnov & Sozanovsky has successfully defended the interests of Soremartec, a member of the Ferrero Group, in the company’s challenge to the Certificate for the “Rafael; my cuisine” (in Russian) trademark as invalid.

The company claimed that the reference to “Rafael” was confusingly similar to the Ferrero Group’s world-wide and well-established “Raffaello” trademarks. 

Konnov & Sozanovsky reports that, as a result of the Soremartec challenge, the defendant abandoned its Certificate for the Trademark. The firm’s team on the matter included Partner Alexey Pokotylo and Assistant Attorney Mariana Polishchuk.