Kirkland & Ellis and DLA Piper have topped the legal advisers rankings in mergers and acquisitions across the Middle East and Africa for 2025, according to figures from GlobalData.

Kirkland & Ellis ranked first by deal value, with the firm advising on transactions totalling $95.8bn.

DLA Piper led the volume chart, advising on 21 transactions.

Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, which advised on $57.2bn worth of deals, was ranked second by value.

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom followed with $51.5bn, Latham & Watkins with $31.4bn, and Meitar Law Offices with $27.6bn.

In terms of deal volume, White & Case took the second place by advising on 20 deals. Latham & Watkins advised on 16 transactions, while both Dentons and Baker McKenzie were involved in 11 deals each.

GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose said: “DLA Piper, apart from occupying the top position by volume, occupied the eighth position by value during 2025. Meanwhile, Kirkland & Ellis, despite advising on much lesser number of deals, led by value. Its involvement in two high-value deals–$55bn acquisition of Electronic Arts by a consortium of investors and $40bn acquisition of Aligned Data Centers from Macquarie Asset Management by a consortium of investors–made all the difference.”

GlobalData’s league tables are based on the real-time tracking of thousands of company websites, advisory firm websites and other reliable sources available on the secondary domain. A dedicated team of analysts monitors all these sources to gather in-depth details for each deal, including adviser names. 

To ensure further robustness to the data, the company also seeks submissions of deals from leading advisers.