Since 2007, he has worked in the legal departments and law offices of leading companies in their sectors such as Kardemir, Türk Henkel, Metro Group Real Estate Management, and Petrol Ofisi. In 2016, he began his position as Legal Affairs Manager for the Turkey, Georgia, and Azerbaijan companies of LUKOIL Group, a global giant in the oil sector.
In the companies where he worked, he successfully resolved over 5,000 lawsuits and enforcement proceedings, collected his client's receivables through settlement in an arbitration file exceeding 100 million dollars, and ensured the consolidation of more than 15 licensed companies to continue their operations uninterrupted under 4 companies. To date, he has managed over 10,000 contract processes, the most notable of which are listed below:
- Petrol Ofisi - Migros: Station Market Operations
- Petrol Ofisi - Chevron: Lubricant Production and Sales
- Petrol Ofisi - Sabiha Gökçen: Fuel Supply and Storage
- LUKOIL - İstanbul Jet: Antalya Airport Storage Facility and Aviation Operations Transfer
- LUKOIL - Various Buyers: Hatay, Batman Fuel Storage Facility Sales
- LUKOIL - BJK, FB, GS, TS: Sponsorship
Throughout his professional career, he has had the opportunity to gain experience in many different areas of law: he personally attended hearings and achieved favorable results in the highest alimony claim divorce case of its time*, a criminal case filed with the accusation of fuel smuggling that posed the risk of canceling his client's distributor license and halting all operations**, and lawsuits filed by a famous client due to over 500 fake accounts.
Oğuz Sami Sarıkaya, who continues his role as Legal and Compliance Manager of LUKOIL Turkey alongside his legal practice and mediation activities, provides training to employees as part of compliance activities, monitors company processes by analyzing them in depth from both technical and commercial perspectives, and contributes to the company's ability to continue its processes without penalties over the past decade, during which competitor companies have received billions of liras in administrative fines from EMRA and the Competition Authority through the measures he has implemented.
As a founding board member of the In-House Lawyers Association and a member of the Better Judiciary Association, in addition to his civil society activities to ensure a brighter future for his profession, he has provided mentorship support to over 100 startups at Istanbul Technical University Çekirdek Incubation Center since 2016.
He is a graduate of Marmara University Faculty of Law (undergraduate) and Özyeğin University Institute of Social Sciences (graduate), and is a member of the Istanbul Bar Association No. 1.
Oğuz Sami Sarıkaya is married and a father of one child.
* The Most Expensive Divorce Case in the History of the Republic