What are the most significant cases and/or transactions that you have been involved in over the past year?

Almarai is the world’s largest vertically integrated dairy company, with operations across 9 countries including all the GCC counties, Egypt, Jordan, Romania, North America (California and Arizona) and South America, Argentina. Almarai has been recognised as the fourth most valuable dairy company worldwide in 2024 by Brand Finance and we rank #11 in market cap vs global F&B players including Coca-Cola, Nestle, PepsiCo and others.

Almarai’s SAR 18bn investment plan, launched in March 2024, embodies our commitment to investing for growth. This transformative strategy is already yielding remarkable outcomes, from a surge in Poultry production to the highly successful debut of Almarai ice cream. The legal team is working alongside with the Strategy team in to assess and evaluate key acquisitions in order to expand our footprint and enhancing our portfolio to meet rising consumer demand while maintaining the exceptional quality Almarai is known for – Quality you can trust. In 2024 the team completed successfully the acquisition of frozen logistics company Etmam Logistics for SAR 182 million. Additional distribution capabilities acquired via Etmam Logistics will enable Almarai to serve customers with an expanded range of frozen products, including poultry, packaged foods and new categories across Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

What innovations have you made to the way your legal team works in the past year?

We have been using GenAI to generate, review, and analyse contracts in order to identify potential risks, anomalies, or non-compliance with specific clauses or regulations. AI enables the legal team to efficiently create and review large volumes of contracts, flagging critical issues for further examination — particularly during due diligence processes in M&A and other business transactions. We are also using automated technology tools to generate legal documents, such as contracts, and have established a digital signing and archiving process. By providing relevant inputs and parameters, the AI can create customised, legally sound documents — saving time and reducing human error. The team has also launched a tender for legal services panel firms, resulting in greater cost efficiency and enhanced value-added services.

Which political, economic or regulatory changes have impacted your work the most in the past year?

Our diverse operations are spread over four continents and thus the legal risks and uncertainties follow the geographies in which we operate. The country and geography mix offers Almarai a balanced approach to the market and associated legal risks. Our learnings from the recent Covid and Russia/Ukrainian conflict on how to deal with force majeure clauses and unforeseen circumstances helped us navigate, successfully and with minimal interruption, the Red Sea crisis as our existing supply arrangements provided for such risks and alternative transportation arrangements. There was a huge transformation in the regulations, new company law in the KSA, personal data privacy rules following the European standards, a new civil code in the KSA and competition rules became stricter. While huge legal transformation takes place, businesses need to adapt and embrace the changes in a manner that does not disrupt growth potential, and regulators have to ensure compliance in a gradual manner as all these changes require the necessary mindset change. The Almarai group legal team is ready to implement these changes in close alignment and collaboration with business.