Partner
Alexey is a cross-border transactions and corporate law specialist with over 25 years of experience spanning technology, luxury and premium fashion, e-commerce, banking, construction and real estate. He holds degrees in civil law from Moscow State Academy of Law (Kutafin University) (magna cum laude, 2004) and a PgDip in International Business Law from the University of Essex (with merit, 2024).
Alexey practises law in the UAE from 2018 and has been leading a corporate and legal advisory boutique since 2022 providing embedded general-counsel services to international businesses operating in the UAE and GCC. Serving as de facto head of legal for multiple clients simultaneously, he delivers full-cycle structuring, M&A execution, compliance design and day-to-day commercial support. His practice spans 15+ UAE free zones — including DIFC, ADGM, DMCC, RAKEZ, JAFZA, DAFZA, IFZA, Ajman and Dubai CommerCity — advising on both English-law and civil-law frameworks.
Prior to founding his own practice, Alexey served as Senior Head of Legal for Farfetch’s Middle East, Russia and CIS operations (2017–2023), managing legal and compliance teams across the UK, US, EU, UAE and CIS (6,000+ employees, 10+ jurisdictions). Before that, he was Director, Legal & Compliance at Lamoda Group (2015–2017), where he built and led a 30-person legal, compliance and GR function across Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan. Earlier, he served as Director, Legal at Sberbank (Krasnaya Polyana) (2013–2015), acting as sole legal business partner to the C-suite on the Sochi Olympic resort project (Gorki Gorod) — total project value approximately RUB 84 billion (~US$2.8 billion).
Key Projects & Achievements
Alexey has led the end-to-end structuring and JV unwind for the largest international luxury online platform and the largest luxury fashion operator in the Middle East. He designed a full beneficiary-protection structure for a major Russian IT company, incorporating call options, share pledges, receiver mechanisms and corporate agreements with banking-compliance resilience. He also architected a sanctions-compliant cross-border supply chain for a premium luxury e-commerce platform with 500,000+ users, delivering the complete contractual, KYC/AML and operational documentation suite.
As external in-house team for a UAE-based AI-native B2B luxury distribution platform, Alexey structured a multi-jurisdictional corporate setup (UAE, Netherlands, China), negotiated marketplace onboarding and closed SAFE rounds at US$20m+ valuation. He also executed a US$40m industrial carve-out across DMCC and Ajman Free Zone and has advised and supported major brands on launching their businesses in the UAE and the Middle East, including Farfetch, 12STOREEZ, BORK, Age of Innocence, Domaine des Artistes, LN Family, CarX, Daigo, Lucky Group and Admitad.
Areas of Expertise
•Corporate structuring across DIFC, ADGM, and 15+ UAE free zones;
•Cross-border M&A, joint ventures, and investment transactions;
•Commercial contracts, IP licensing, and data privacy;
•Real estate transactions, employment law, and regulatory compliance;
•Sanctions/export-controls architecture and compliance programme design.
Languages:
English (fluent/professional), Russian (native).