Taher Helmy

Taher Helmy has been with the Firm for over three decades. He is the co-founder and senior partner of the Egyptian law firm Helmy, Hamza & Partners and senior partner of the international law firm Baker McKenzie. He also co- founded the Riyadh office and practiced there for four years. A member of the Illinois and Chicago Bar Associations, he is admitted before the US Federal Court and was the first Arab lawyer to be admitted before the US Supreme Court in 1979. He is admitted before Egypt’s Supreme Court and was admitted to practice in Saudi Arabia in 1979. 

He joined Baker McKenzie in May 1975. In 1981, he was elected full partner in Chicago, where he practiced for about nine years. He then practiced in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for four years, in Egypt since 1987, and for the past six years between London and Cairo, handling corporate, banking and commercial matters. He served as a member of Baker McKenzie’s Strategic Planning Committee, Global Policy Committee and EMEA Regional Council. He currently serves on the Gulf Offices Managing Body. 

• Advised Idnorama Ventures, one of the world's leading producers in the intermediate petrochemicals industry, in connection with its acquisition of s MEDCO for Packaging and Business Systems S.A.E.
• Acting for the Egyptian Ministry of Planning in relation to the preparing the bylaws of Egypt first sovereign Fund.
• Acted for Telecom Egypt in its US 130 million acquisition of a stake in Vodafone Egypt and entering into a strategic JV with Vodafone Group.
• We represented Telecom Egypt in a bid for the acquisition of an interest in the Bahrain Telecommunications Company BSC and of its subsidiaries and associated entities

• Banking
• Capital markets: Equity
• M&A
• Private equity
• Project finance

• Banking
• Oil and gas
• Real estate
• Tech and telecoms
• Tourism
• Utilities

• Saudi Arabia (1979)
• U.S. Supreme Court~United States (1979)
• Egypt (1977)
• Illinois~United States (1975)

• Former member of the Strategic Planning Committee, the Global Policy Committee and the EMEA Regional Council of Baker McKenzie. 
• Member of Baker McKenzie Gulf Offices Managing Body.
• Former member of the board of trustees of the Government’s Investment Authority.
• Member of Egypt’s National Production Council. 
• He is the principal founder and past chairman of the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies, the first independent, private, non-profit economic Think Tank in Egypt. 
• He is the former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Egypt and former member of the US/Egypt President’s Council. 
• He is the former co-chairman of the US-Egypt Business Leaders Forum and founder and member of the executive board of Egypt’s International Economic Forum. 
• He is a co-founder of the British Egyptian Businessmen Association 
• Member of the French Chamber of Commerce. 
• He is a founder and a member of the Board of Trustees of the British Egyptian Foundation for Children in Need. 
• He served on the Board of the Binational Fulbright commission. 
• He served on the board of the Washington based educational organization Amideast. 
• He currently serves on the Board of Trustees of Nile University in Egypt. 
• He is a founder of the American University in Cairo Legal Masters Program.

• St. Louis University (J.D.) (1974)
• St. Louis University (A.B.) (1971)