As part of Riyadh International Disputes Week (RIDW), Horizons & Co. and BCLP hosted a discussion on the evolving real estate and construction dispute resolution landscape in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and wider region. This interactive discussion involved questions from the audience throughout the session and resulted in many meaningful points being raised. Below is a high-level takeaway of the key issues discussed and points raised.

The recent changes to the UAE Federal Arbitration Regime (set out in Federal Decree 15 of 2023 (“the Amendment”) have been rightly welcomed by the arbitration community, especially in relation to the regulation of arbitrators’ conduct and recognition of the increased use and worth of technology platforms. These proactive amendments to a still relatively new law do indeed represent a robust approach to keeping up to date with fast-evolving practice, and a strong statement of intent as regards the UAE’s continuing ambition to be a leading hub for dispute resolution. There has been much excellent and thought-provoking commentary on the content of the Amendment from practitioners and others in the arbitration community. So, for a slightly different take, we thought it might be interesting to look at the whole landscape from the perspective of the parties, and/or their transactional advisors, at the front-end.

BCLP has been ranked in 14 practice areas across 4 jurisdictions in the 2023 edition of The Legal 500 EMEA Guide.