Conference “Digitalisation and Company Law”, 21 September 2023

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On 21 September, the Council of the Notariats of the European Union (CNUE) organised a conference in Brussels on “Digitalisation and Company Law”. In the context of the European Commission’s recent proposal for a Directive on upgrading digital company law, experts from the fields of politics, business and law discussed the challenges and opportunities presented by digitalisation in the field of justice.

The event brought together more than 200 participants, in person and via streaming, as well as high-level speakers. For the first panel devoted to the proposed Directive, Maria-Manuel Leitão-Marques, Member of the European Parliament and shadow rapporteur for the new Directive, and Ralf Sauer, Deputy Head of the Company Law Unit at the European Commission, took part in the discussions. In the second panel, MEP Andreas Schwab, rapporteur of the digital Market Act, Simona Constantin, Deputy Head of Cabinet of European Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová, and Jens Bormann, President of the German Federal Chamber of Notaries, discussed with expert from practice which challenges and opportunities digitalization in the field of justice brings.

Through its President Peter Stelmaszczyk, the CNUE reaffirmed its support for the European Commission’s proposal for a Directive, which aims, in particular, to:

– achieving more digitalisation and fewer unnecessary formalities;

– improving business registers and simplifying cross-border procedures;

– ensuring legal certainty and reliability and preventing illegal activities.

Peter Stelmaszczyk welcomed the European Commission’s initiative to facilitate companies’ activities on the internal market and underlined, that this proposal must make sure that the current high standards of registers shall not be undermined. Public authorities (courts, administrative authorities and/or notaries) will do their best to support this cause.

The new proposal for a Directive is part of a wider context of actions recently initiated by the European Commission with a view to digitalising the EU economy. The advantages of current initiatives, such as the Digital Market Act, the revision of the e-IDAS Regulation, the Regulation on cross-border judicial cooperation of the new AI Act where the topic of the second panel, which engaged into a vivid discussion.

For more information on the conference: www.notariesofeurope-conference.eu

The video recording of the conference will be available in the next few days.