Our Team
Ayan Tashmagambetov
Supervisor
PhD in Law (Karaganda Police Academy), LLM (University College of London).
Legal practitioner (Chamber of Kazakh Legal Practitioners), AIFC Registered Legal Services Provider.
15+ years of legal experience in public and private companies (Constitutional Council, Ministry of Justice, AIFC Authority, Police Department, Korkem Telecom LLP, Bolashak Academy).
Expertise in civil, corporate, contract, commercial, criminal law and procedures, AIFC law, English common law, M&A, mining, enforcement of court decisions, GR, business development.
Our speakers
Alexander KOROBEINIKOV
Partner at Baker McKenzie Kazakhstan, Arbitrator, Mediator, Registered arbitrator in IAC AIFC, Member of the Supporting Competition in the CIS Non-commercial Partnership | SCC Young Arbitrators Stockholm | ICC Young Arbitrators Forum (Paris) | ICC European Arbitration Group (Paris) | Kazakhstan Bar Association
Alexander KOROBEINIKOV is an international attorney and partner at the Kazakhstan office of Baker McKenzie. He has a wide experience participating in litigation in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Central Asia, as well as in international arbitration cases in accordance with the arbitration rules of the ICAC, UNCITRAL, ICC, SCC, LCIA and other arbitration institutions, as both a counsel and arbitrator.
Alexander specializes in the following areas:
Mr. Korobeinikov is the author of a number of articles on Belarusian, Kazakhstani, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Russian and English law issues, including international arbitration, dispute resolution, antimonopoly and bankruptcy proceedings.
He also has expertise in the following areas:
Andrey Artyushenko is a managing partner and a founder of Artyushenko & Partners boutique law firm (Kazakhstan, Almaty). In 2001, he graduated from the State Law Academy of Kazakhstan with a law degree. He has accumulated more than 22 years of experience in contract law, real estate construction, FIDIC contracts (EPC, EPCM), PPP, corporate matters, and foreign investments.
He has supervised numerous projects in the areas of:
Andrey’s clients are, among others, JLL (Jones Lang LaSalle), Siemens Kazakhstan, Safmar Property (UK), Capital Partners (Kazakhstan), Kar-Tel (Beeline), Saraiva + Associados (Portugal), Citec Engineering (Finland), PGI France (France), Arabtec Consolidators Contractors Company, Vinci Construction and Leroy Merlin.
Andrey is an arbitrator (Atameken Arbitration), NACEC member (FIDIC in Russia), speaker and trainer.
He has experience representing clients in IAC, Atameken, ICC, LCIA, Abu Dhabi Commercial Conciliation & Arbitration Centre, etc.
Dr Can Eken is an assistant professor in commercial law at Durham University. He teaches international commercial dispute resolution course at Durham Law School. He is a triple-qualified lawyer admitted as a solicitor in England and Wales and an attorney in California, USA and Turkey. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, and he is on the panel of arbitrators at the Thailand Arbitration Centre (THAC) and Shanghai International Arbitration Centre (SHIAC). Prior to Durham, Dr Eken practiced law and worked as a research assistant.
Dr Eken studied an LLM degree at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and another LLM degree at Dokuz Eylul University in Turkiye where he also obtained his bachelor's degree in law with high honour degree. He completed his PhD degree at the Faculty of Law at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Dr Eken spent an academic year at Stanford University in 2019–2020 and two months at the Max Planck Institute in Luxembourg in 2021 as a visiting scholar. He has many publications on international commercial arbitration, investment law, third-party funding and online dispute resolution. He regularly gives lectures and consultancy on international commercial arbitration and investment law.
Carol Hiu Yan CHENG
Solicitor
England and Wales | The Republic of Ireland | Hong Kong SAR
Rights of audience before the Astana International Finance Centre (AIFC) Court in Kazakhstan
Arbitrator
LCIA (London) | PIAC (Vietnam)
Carol Hiu Yan CHENG is an internationally recognized and highly qualified lawyer. She is a qualified solicitor in England and Wales, the Republic of Ireland and Hong Kong SAR, and has rights of audience before the AIFC Court in Kazakhstan. Ms. Cheng is included on various panels and databases of arbitrators, including the London Court of International Arbitration (LCIA, London) and the Pacific International Arbitration Centre (PIAC, Vietnam).
In addition to speaking fluent English, Cantonese and Mandarin, Ms. Cheng has a working knowledge of French and Spanish. Ms. Cheng obtained her law degrees at The University of Cambridge, The University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Hong Kong. She has been practising as a solicitor at Linklaters LLP since 2015, and is currently working as a High Court Judicial Assistant at the Commercial Court in England and Wales. She has previously completed a six-month secondment to HSBC and acted as a court marshall to Lord Justice Hooper in the Court of Appeal of England and Wales.
Ms. Cheng has experience acting for prominent clients around the world including in the following areas:
Leveraged finance
Barrister in England and Wales | Solicitor in Hong Kong SAR | Arbitrator (AIAC – Malaysia, BAIAC – Singapore, CACM – Mozambique, CAA – Taipei, FINRA – US/Puerto Rico, HIAC – Hainan, ICC – UK, LCIA – London, LMAA – London, PIAC – Vietnam, SHAC – Shanghai, SHIAC – Shanghai, SCC – Stockholm, WTC Macau Arbitration Center – Macau, Sport Resolutions (International)) | Adjudicator (HKA – Hong Kong, LMAA – London, TECBAR – UK, UKA – UK)
Grace Tsz Yan CHENG is an internationally recognized and highly qualified lawyer. She is an English barrister, a qualified Hong Kong solicitor and has rights of audience before the AIFC Court in Kazakhstan. Ms. Cheng is a member of the UK Bar Council's ADR Panel, and is included on various panels and databases of arbitrators and adjudicators around the world.
In addition to speaking fluent English, Cantonese and Mandarin, Ms. Cheng has a working knowledge of French and Spanish. Ms. Cheng obtained her law degrees at The London School of Economics and Political Science, the University of Oxford, and the University of Hong Kong. She is a member of numerous professional associations around the world and regularly delivers lectures on various legal topics of interest including Commercial Law, International Business Dispute Settlement, and the role of FinTech in the law.
Ms. Cheng has taught at many prestigious institutions including the University of Oxford, King’s College London, University of Hong Kong, and National Taiwan University. She previously worked at Slaughter and May and was judicial assistant to the Honourable Mr Justice Blair when he was Judge in Charge of the Commercial Court.
Gulnur Nurkeyeva is a Head of China Office and responsible for all China Related projects in countries of GRATA International presence.
Gulnur has over 20 years of experience in Kazakhstani legal services market.
She has started her career in 1999 in Astana Bar association as Qualified Advocate. Later she worked for Kazakhstan Government in the Ministry of taxes and participated in drafting first tax Code of Kazakhstan.
Prior to joining GRATA Law Firm, she worked more than 10 years as an in-house (later head of Legal Department) in National Welfare Fund "Samruk-Kazyna" Group.
Samruk –Kazyna manage the shares of the State-Owned Enterprises in oil and gas, metallurgical, nuclear, telecommunication, transport sectors, such as KazMunayGas, Kazatomprom, Kazakhtelecom, Kazakhstan Railway, KazPost, Air Astana, Kazakhstan Electricity Grid Operating Company (KEGOC), Samruk-Energy.
The practice led by Gulnur has become a winner of China Business Law Awards 2015-2016 in the category of “Energy, Projects and Infrastructure”.
Membership
Gulnur Nurkeyeva specializes in the following areas:
She has experience of legal counseling of clients in the following industries:
Kulzhan is a dual-qualified lawyer with a multi-industry background and a comprehensive and diversified legal experience. She specialises in dispute resolution and is admitted to practise in England and Kazakhstan.
Her practice is focused on cross-border commercial litigation, international arbitration and fraud/asset tracing cases. She is equally experienced in multi-jurisdictional corporate, M&A and commercial transactions. Kulzhan’s experience includes working in city and foreign law firms, magic circle English practices, state-owned enterprises, governmental agencies, embassies and international organisations.
She received numerous academic accolades including first class degrees from universities in England and Kazakhstan at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Her education and qualifications include LLB (International Law, Kazakhstan), LLB/LPC/LLM/QLTS (English Law, England).
In addition, she is fluent in English, Russian and Kazakh languages.
Lei SHI is a lawyer licensed in China, a highly qualified arbitrator at THAC, VIAC, SCC, LCIA and accredited mediator at SQICMC. Lei has experience helping international clients with their business in Chinese market. Being involved in foreign direct investment in China, Lei was acting as sole legal counsel for prominent foreign clients to fulfill their business plans in Chinese mainland and Hong Kong SAR.
With several years of corporate services, Lei has profound knowledge and experience in the following areas:
Lei also represents clients in courts, arbitration centers with right of audience in China and AIFC in Kazakhstan.
With several years of dispute resolution experiences, Lei specialized in dealing with complex disputes arising from:
He holds a master degree from University College London (UCL) and specializes in the following areas:
Professional in Compliance and AML/CFT area, successful experience in creating and improving Compliance and AML/CFT systems in banks, brokerage, leasing and fintech companies.
CAMS, lecturer of the national AML/CFT certification program, Associate Professor, finalist of Compliance Week and ICA Rising Star Awards, author of 150+ articles on Compliance, AML/CFT and fintech in local and foreign media.
Edward is currently a member at Pantheon Chambers. He has a broad-based practice that primarily focuses on general civil and criminal cases. He has experience in a range of areas, such as, commercial, probate, arbitration, company, and land law.
EDUCATION
SELECTED APPOINTMENTS
LANGUAGES
English (Native), Cantonese (Native), Mandarin (Fluent) and French (Elementary).
Aigul is a solution focused professional with 15+ years of experience in internal control, corporate governance, risk management, compliance, forensics consultancy and financial advisory. Since 2011 Aigul is a Corporate Executive running own management consultancy practice and providing professional services to public and private companies in Financial Industry, Oil and Gas, Fintech, Mining, Construction, Retail, Manufacturing and other. She is working closely with Government Authorities, Financial Regulators, International organizations.
She possessed Top managerial positions in state-owned companies and leading financial institutions in CIS countries and achieved significant results in formation of Financial Holding, Mergers and acquisitions, Business performance enhancement and Costs optimization. Aigul was a key team member of IPO teams both in State Oil&Gas Company and one of the Top 5 Banks of Kazakhstan which successfully held an IPO on London Stock Exchange.
Aigul was the first to host a large-scale event on Governance, Risk and Compliance in Central Asia (First Kazakhstani GRC Forum, 2012) that gathered international leaders and like-minded experts in the field of Risk management, Governance, Ethics and compliance, as well as law makers, regulators and International organizations.
Currently she is running a boutique management consultancy company in UAE with International exposure.
Aigul holds a graduate International Diploma in Compliance and Master of Science in Business Studies. Since 2008, she has been providing professional trainings on anti-corruption compliance, IPO Ethics&Compliance, Internal Control, IFRS, Corporate Governance, AML&CFT, Fraud investigation, Business Continuity and other.
Among attendants are the specialists from financial institutions, public and state-owned companies, regulators, non for profit organizations, government authorities from Middle East, Europe and Central Asia. Aigul is an expert-trainer of RIT Dubai.
In 2020, as an expansion of her business, there was established subsidiary company Atelier Ltd. in Astana International Financial Center. The most important task of Atelier is providing management consultancy services of exceptional quality. Aigul is the Advisory Partner of Atelier.
In 2021, together with international partners, she established the first professional organization for compliance specialists in Switzerland - The Institute of Chartered Compliance Professionals, which key focus is designing international compliance standards.
Adam is an accomplished C-suite senior executive (CIO, COO and CFO) and non-executive director, who has lived and worked globally for 18 years. He has worked in different settings: multinationals, private equity, banking, investment management, real estate, family offices and government. He is currently the Chief Investment Officer for one of the Dubai Government's sovereign wealth funds (multi-sector, multi-asset class and multi-geography), where he set up their investment function from scratch, formulated their investment strategy, and put in place all of their corporate and operational governance frameworks. Previous roles include: Deputy Head of Banking (and acting COO) for the Australian subsidiary of a Middle Eastern bank, COO for a regulated private family office in the Middle East (with divisions encompassing principal investments, funds management and corporate advisory), and COO for HSBC's real estate private equity business in the Middle East.
PROFESSIONAL QUALIFICATIONS
• Fellow, Australian Institute of Company Directors.
• Fellow, Australian Institute of Management.
• Solicitor of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.
• Fellow, GCC Board Directors Institute.
EXPERIENCE AND CORE COMPETENCIES
• An accomplished senior executive (CIO, COO and CFO) with over 20 years of global experience in multinationals, banking, private equity, investment management, family offices and sovereign wealth funds. • Significant functional experience in finance, investments, risk management, governance, legal, product development, investor relations, capital raising and strategy.
• Substantial sector experience in banking (retail, corporate, investment), investment management (across all sectors, asset classes and geographies), government (investment strategy, deployment of capital, and implementation of corporate and operational governance frameworks), and real estate (investment, management, and development, in commercial, residential, industrial, and retail real estate).
• Extensive experience in successfully leading highly motivated, skilled, and culturally diverse teams through favourable and unfavourable circumstances, both internally and externally, achieving and even exceeding benchmark performance.
• Over 20 years of rich experience as a non-executive director on several operational and advisory boards in trade and investment, financial services, technology, funds management, family/private offices, property, education, healthcare, and medical research and endowments.
Roman is an arbitration specialist with extensive experience in national and cross-border matters, with particular emphasis on shareholder and energy disputes. He holds a Ph. D in Conflict of Laws.
Roman is a Visiting Professor in the Centre for Commercial Law at Queen Mary University of London. He has also lectured at Clare College, Cambridge University, l’Université Paris-Saclay (Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin) and Exeter University.
Additionally, in 2015-2018 Roman was an alternative member of the ICC Court of International Arbitration in Paris.
In recent years Roman has advised on a multi-million dollar ICSID investment treaty arbitration against the Republic of Kazakhstan, and acted in LCIA, ICC, AAA and MKAS arbitrations. Roman also represented athletes before the Ad Hoc Division of the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Roman is a dual qualified solicitor of the Senior Courts of England and Wales and a Russian advocate.
For several years running, Roman has been highly recommended as one of the leading international arbitration lawyers both in Russia and UK by Chambers & Partners and The Legal 500 Guides. He is also recognised by peers in the Best Lawyers 2019 Edition in Arbitration and Mediation, International Arbitration and Litigation. Clients describe Roman as “commercially focused, the go-to person in London when a case has a Russian aspect” (Chambers Europe, 2018) and “tremendously hard working and goal-oriented, he delivers the best possible service at all times” (The Legal 500, 2018).
