Legal Director – AI – UAE

• Dubai
• Full Time

Reference: EL0157

PQE: 15yrs+

Consultant: Liam Taaffe

Our client is the technology and AI growth engine of a multi-billion-dollar enterprise, actively building one of the most consequential AI infrastructure platforms in the MENA region. This is a high-stakes transformation mandate, not a steady-state operation. You will provide the legal leadership to make the companies rapid growth defensible. You will own end-to-end contract negotiations across technically complex, high-value commercial arrangements spanning GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS), data centre agreements, and chip procurement. Your mandate is clear: protect the business while enabling rapid, frictionless execution.

The Role

You will lead high-stakes, SLA-driven contract negotiations for GPU-as-a-Service (GPUaaS) and cloud environments, defining critical technical benchmarks like uptime commitments and remediation frameworks. You will drive the full legal lifecycle for chip procurement, data centre services, platform licensing, and enterprise customer agreements from initial term sheet through to execution. Navigating global compliance will be a core responsibility as you manage complex export controls, trade compliance, and cross-border technology transfers—specifically regarding US-origin hardware and software—across the MENA region and beyond. Furthermore, you will build organizational infrastructure by establishing robust legal playbooks and contract management frameworks that support high-volume commercial velocity without sacrificing rigour. Throughout these initiatives, you will act as a strategic advisor, partnering directly with the C-suite, Commercial, Finance, and Technology teams to translate complex technical realities into enforceable, commercially sound contracts.

The Candidate

The ideal candidate brings 15–20 years of post-qualification legal experience, backed by a proven track record in technology, cloud services, Artificial Intelligence infrastructure, or hardware procurement, with a strong preference for prior in-house experience in a high-growth tech environment. You possess deep technical depth in infrastructure-specific SLAs, GPU-as-a-Service models, and multi-party commercial structures. Your regulatory savvy includes hands-on experience dealing with international export controls and cross-border technology compliance. As a leader, you operate as a strategic partner who communicates legal risk in sharp commercial terms, bringing the confidence to push back and the sound judgement required to move fast. A significant differentiator for this role is practical experience negotiating against hyperscalers, GPU manufacturers, or major data centre operators.

This role is not for a generalist lawyer who has touched technology. It is designed for a true specialist who has lived—and thrived—at the absolute intersection of legal, commercial, and technical complexity.

For more details, please contact Liam Taaffe at EMEA Legal Recruitment for more details.