This dispute concerns Saudi Arabia’s decision to close its borders and cut trade relations with Qatar in 2017 and the impact on Qatar Pharma, a Qatari company manufacturing generic pharmaceuticals and exporting them in the region. Qatar Pharma argued Saudi Arabia’s border closure prevented the company from accessing its key market, amounting to an expropriation.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia retained NERA to provide expert testimony on damages. The NERA team consisted of Senior Managing Director Richard Hern, Director Zuzana Janeckova, and Consultant Tarek Badrakhan. NERA was asked to present an independent assessment of damages and respond to the opposing experts’ quantification of damages.

To assess whether Qatar Pharma’s claim was based on reasonable assumptions and to inform its own valuation of damages, NERA analyzed developments in the Middle Eastern generic pharmaceuticals market, including market growth forecasts, Qatar Pharma’s historical performance, business plan projections produced by Qatar Pharma and options Qatar Pharma had to mitigate its losses. NERA estimated damages using a discounted cash flow model as the difference between the value of Qatar Pharma in two scenarios, one with and one without the alleged breach.

Dr. Hern presented NERA’s analysis of damages in two expert reports and provided oral testimony at a hearing in London in May 2023.