Nasirud Doulah

Practice Areas

15+ years' seasoned practice in energy, corporate, finance and construction matters with project finance / development and documentary credit as stressed areas. Advised in major projects in energy / infrastructure sector with extensive PPP / infrastructure transaction advisory experience. Key researcher to complete Bangladesh Corporate Governance Country Assessment Report for IFC. Attended a number of significant M&A matters. Transaction highlights are as follows:

• Acted as legal counsel for Excelerate Energy in project development and financing aspects of the first LNG terminal (FSRU) project in Bangladesh. Acted for a lender in the second LNG terminal (FSRU) project developed by Summit in Maheshkhali. Advised UK Export Credit Agency in project financing in Escorp LPG. Extensive experience in upstream energy matters and acted for all of the latest gas exploration and production sharing contracts awarded to ONGC, OIL, POSCO & Daewoo, Santos an so on.

• Structured and developed 90+ power projects for clients like General Electric, Blackstone, Golar Power, AES, El Paso etc. Have been Representing major players in developing renewable IPPs such as Sinennergy, Scatec, CMEC, Total, ZTE, Sharp etc. Acted for the sponsors in the first utility scale solar park ay Mymensing for China Huadian, first waste to energy power plant for China Machinery Engineering Company and first Solar-Gas-Bettery integrated project at Bay of Bengal. Advised pool of Singapore based institutional investors in subscribing Beximco's Green Sukuk to finance Beximco legacy business and a series of solar parks.

• Acted for General Electric in a large number of power project development matters including its significant stake acquisition in 483MW Summit Meghnaghat CCGP power plant, 478 MW Unique Meghnaghat CCGP power plant and a 1250 MW CCGP power plant development with a state owned enterprise.

• Acts as local counsel for ADB's trade finance matters in Bangladesh. Recently completed advising ADB Ventures in a seed financing in a energy start up in Bangladesh. Currently advising ADB in project finance mandated to a distributed power plant with a scaled capacity of 100MW+.

• So far has been involved as local legal counsel by IFC in three PPP technical advisory mandates for LNG terminals, port container terminals and airport terminals. Other major PPP / infrastructure development projects include major toll road PPPs i.e. First Dhaka Elevated / Dhaka Bypass / RAD Expressways, Payra Port (for JDN), 2nd Kanchpur-Meghna-Gumti Bridges, South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Road, Shahjalal Airport 3rd Terminal project etc. Acted for sponsors/lenders in project development of major economic zones including Chinese Economic Zone at Anwara and China-Bangladesh Iron & Steel Production Zone.

• Just completed AFD in project financing of Urban Governance And Infrastructure Improvement - III project. Acted as Lender's Counsel for ADB, AFD, IFC, European Investment Bank, Islamic Development Bank, Finnish Fund for Industrial Development, Societe Generale and so on in numerous projects.

• Acted as local counsel for China Export - Import Bank (CEXIM) in the largest project financing in Bangladesh for USD 2.4 billion 2x662 MW Payra-II Thermal Power Plant. Just acted as local counsel for China Development Bank (CDB) in its project financing of Dhaka Bypass Expressway. Acted for China Shandong HiSpeed and Sinohydro in project financing of First Dhaka Elevated Expressway. Also acted for CEXIM, CDB , Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Citic Bank and Agricultural Bank of China in numerous project financing matters. Acted for Sinosure in three coal fired power plants and two solar parks at the role of Export Credit Agency counsel.

• Advised a large number of clients on EPC contracts including FIDIC formats. Advised Sumitomo on the metro-rail EPC contract and TBEA on Dhaka city underground cabling project. Other major clients include Kajima Corporation, JGC, Jalux and Mitsui.

• Major M&As in financial sector includes Shenzhen Stock Exchange / Shanghai Stock Exchange Aquisition of significant stake in Dhaka Stock Exchange, Bill & Melinda Gate Foundation's acquisition of significant stake in Bkash followed by partial divestment to Ant Financial and Softbank, The Social Loan Company acquisition of Cashe Alliance, Capital Alliance Ltd. acquisition of a merchant bank in Bangladesh, restructure of HSBC and so on.

• Major M&As in energy sector includes Santos divestment, Picnic Corporation acquisition of Summit Surma Petroleum (LPG) terminal & plant, Zhenhua's USD2 billion bid for three gas fields, Ophir acquisition of Santos assets and merger with Medco, AES acquisition of Covanta power assets, Beringia acquisition of two power plants, China Huadian acquisition of a 70 MW solar park, Powerchina acquisition of a 100MW solar park and so on.

• Other major M&As include Holcim / Lafarge Merger, Microsoft acquisition of Nokia business undertakings, Nokia Acquisition of Alcatel Lucent, ITS acquisition of Huawei business undertakings, acquisition of tower assets by clients like American Tower Company, M1, Towershare, Kwap, Khazanah and so on, Airtel demerger, acquisition of data centers and acquisition of stakes in mobile operators in Bangladesh. Other significant clients in M&A include A&E, Underwrite Laboratories, Toll, CMA CGM, Beximco Pharmaceuticals, GSK, Sun Pharmaceuticals, Flex Foils, Gulf Pharmaceuticals, Pepsi Co. and so on.

• Major lease /asset finance clients include GECAS, Aercape, EDC etc. Major fintech clients include Ant Financial, Microsoft, Amazon, Google and Facebook. Also represents global institutional investors like Citibank, Morgan Stanley, Blackrock, Fonterra etc. on capital market.

Publications

PPP Guidebook (Cakmak), Legal Aspects of Doing Business (CILS), Project Finance (GTDT), Corporate Governance (World Bank), Foreign Tax & Trade Briefs, Digest of the Commercial Laws of the World (WestLaw), Renewable Power (ICLG)

Personal

BSc. Engg. (BUET), LLB (University of London), MBA-Finance (IBA). Member of Thomas Jefferson School of Law Tax, and AML research teams