Sameh Khodeir

Practice Areas

Oil & Gas, Arbitration

Career

Mr. Sameh Khodeir, Senior Partner, is Head of the Oil & Gas Department at ZH. Having joined the Firm in 1982, he has been extending his skills and expertise to the fields of Corporates oil & gas, energy, mining, finance, litigation, international Commercial arbitration law, labour law, and the structuring of companies and transactions.

Mr. Khodeir’s professional track record includes 30+ Concession agreements, 40+ deeds of assignment, and an extensive number of settlement agreements for oil & gas disputes as well as arbitrations in petroleum explorations and production (E&P). Mr. Khodeir recently handled an arbitration over the supply of crude oil with a disputed value of US$ 200 million. The award ruled in favour of ZH’s client.

With a vast experience exceeding 47 years, other selected examples of Mr. Khodeir’s expertise include:

* Advising on four mega projects exceeding the value of US$ 1 up to 3 Billion, namely,

1. Advising INVAP, from construction to hand-over, on the Second Nuclear Research Reactor and Radioisotopes Projects. (since 1991);

2. Advising on the legal structure, EPC Contract and Financing of Damietta LNG Project - the first LNG project in Egypt. (2000); and

3. Advising on the US$ 600 million Syndicated Loan Agreement granted by Credit Agricole Indosuez, Sucursal in Spain, the Royal Bank of Scotland PLC, and the Royal Bank of Canada in connection with Damietta LNG Project. (2000/2001)

4. Special Advisor to the Egyptian Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) in a US$ 1.55 billion forward Sale Contract of Crude Oil arranged by Morgan Stanley. (2005)

* Special Advisor to the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) in a US$ 1.55 billion forward Sale Contract of Crude Oil arranged by Morgan Stanley. (2005)

* Advising Middle East Oil Refinery (MIDOR) on the EPC Contract and Financing for the Modernization, Upgrade and Expansion of a New Refinery. (2015 – 2020)

* Legal Advisor to Hydrocracking Project of ANOPC (ASSIUT) including legal structure, EPC Contract and Financing of around US$ 2,7 Billion Project. (2019)

* Advising the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company in its USD 1.6 billion EPC contract of the Egyptian-Saudi Linkage Project. (2019)

* Extending Legal support to RAKTA regarding the EUR 10.5 million Tender for Rehabilitation of Machinery. (2019)

* Legal Advisor to the National Bank of Egypt and Mashreque Bank in re-financing to EGPC – USD 835 million. (2022)

Mr. Khodeir also acted as the legal advisor to a large number of multi-national Investments operating in Egypt in the sectors of:

i) Exploration and Exploitation of Oil & Gas (e.g. IEOC, Apache, Sipetorl – among others);

ii) Petroleum Services in drilling and Services Contracts (e.g. Schlumberger, SantaFe which became Shelf Drilling - among others);

iii) Mining (e.g. Barrick Gold) and Pharmaceuticals (e.g. NOVARTIS, Otsuka – among others); and

iv) Trading (e.g. Cargill – among others); and v) International Organizations (e.g. JETRO, JICA, and JBIC – among others).

In addition to the above, he also acted as Special Legal Advisor to the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) and the Egyptian Petrochemical Holding Company on specific transactions.

Mr. Khodeir adeptly maintains solid long-standing relations with his clients. He has been the legal advisor to IEOC since 1984, to Santa Fe since 1984 (and through its merger and acquisition by Transocean), to Alitalia (Egypt) since 1983 he handled 3 changes and re-structuring of legal existence of the Italian Carrier, to Le Meridien Hotel since 1988, to the Four Seasons Hotel in Cairo since 2011, to EGPC since 1985 - among others.

Recently he is the Legal Advisor to Damietta, Alexandria, Sokhna and Red Sea Port Authorities in different Concession Agreements for new Terminals in such Ports in cooperation with the Ministry of Transportation.

He is member of the Egyptian Association for International Law; the Egyptian Association for Politics, Economics, Statistics and Legislation; the American Chamber of Commerce in Egypt; the Egyptian Lebanese Business Association; and the British Egyptian Business Association. He is also a member of the BOD of the Japanese-Egyptian Business Council.

Mr. Khodeir is selected to be a Board Member in the Golden Triangle Economic Zone Authority as well as in many companies.

Mr. Khodeir is often sought after to lecture as a practitioner in universities and institutions such as his lectures on the legal regime of Oil & Gas regime and the Investments in Egypt delivered to post-graduate students at Harvard Law School in 2010.

Chambers and Partners ranked Mr. Sameh Khodeir as Band 1 Lawyer in Projects & Energy in 2021 and as Band 2 Lawyer in 2022 and 2023. IFLR1000 ranked him as “Highly Regarded Leading Lawyer” in the Project Finance and M&A practices in 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022. He had been ranked as “Highly Regarded Leading Lawyer” in Project Finance and Banking in 2018 and as “Leading Lawyer” in the Financial and Corporate practice in 2016 and 2017. The LEGAL 500 ranked him as “Leading Individual” in the Energy practice in 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023. The LEGAL 500 had also recommended him in the Arbitration practice in 2018 and 2019 and had ranked him as “Leading Individual” in the Oil & Gas practice in 2016 and 2017.

Mr. Khodeir achieved the LLB from Cairo University 's Faculty of Law in 1975.