Mohamed Ridza Abdullah
Mohamed Ridza Abdullah is now the managing partner of Mohamed Ridza & Co, a legal 500 boutique corporate law firm based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Prior to opening the firm, Ridza was a partner and was head of his division with Zaid Ibrahim & Co. Ridza graduated with a LLB (First Class Hons) from the International Islamic University Malaysia in 1992 and was called to the Malaysian Bar in 1993.
He began his career a corporate finance and projects lawyer at the firm of Rashid & Lee in Malaysia. He later joined Arab Malaysian Corporation Berhad as the group legal adviser. Being the group legal adviser, he was instrumental in setting up the legal department of the Amcorp Group of Companies. Ridza left Arab Malaysian to become the General Legal Counsel of Technip Asia Pacific based in Kuala Lumpur and was previously attached at Technip headquarters in Paris, France.
Ridza is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators (FCIS), an Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (ACI Arb) and a Fellow of Malaysian Society of Adjudicators. He is an accredited mediator with the Bar Council at Malaysia, a certified adjudicator and also a panel arbitrator with the Kuala Lumpur Regional Centre of Arbitration in the area of Islamic Banking & Finance.
He has advised on a wide variety of corporate, financing in particular Islamic finance and capital markets and commercial matters including mergers and acquisitions of listed and non-listed entities, listings of public companies, joint venture and consortium agreements involving foreign and multinational companies, venture capitalist transactions, capital markets and real estate projects. He also advises broadly on major state and federal privatisation projects particularly in the oil and gas industry and property development. Ridza also specialises in technology, telco and fintech related contracts and acquisitions. He has presented many papers in conferences on areas relating to corporate governance, financing, capital markets, technology, fintech, digital transformation, S17A MACC, mergers and acquisitions. Ridza achievements have ranked him as a one of the top 100 lawyers in Malaysia for 3 years in a row by Asia Business Journal.
Ridza also sits as an independent director on the board of several public companies and also their respective audit committees. He chairs the board technology committee of a bank and is involved in the setting up of the bank’s digital banking business. At another public listed company, Ridza chairs the board risk committee and oversees the company’s technology and digital business. In addition, Ridza is also the author of several publications including: The Law and Practice of Islamic Banking & Finance (now in its 3rd edition); and The Life and Law of Fintech published by Sweet & Maxwell.
At the international scene, Ridza has advised clients in Singapore, the Middle East, the Philippines, Canada, Brunei, Indonesia, Myanmar, Turkey, Morocco, Libya, the USA, Lebanon, Australia and Europe.
