About this consultation
Consultation period: 21 December 2021 – 29 March 2022 (midnight Brussels time)
Topic: Justice and fundamental rights
Target audience
The Commission is seeking the views of a broad range of stakeholders. These stakeholders include, in particular: – Member State national authorities, such as business registers, tax authorities, labour law authorities, courts, beneficial owner registers; – Companies, including SMEs and start-ups, and business associations/organisations; – Trade unions; – Legal professionals (e.g. lawyers, notaries); – Investors, creditors; – Academic experts, think tanks; – Citizens; – Other stakeholders (e.g. other users of company data).
Why we are consulting
The ongoing digital transition of the economy and society has substantial impacts on companies, including small and medium-sized companies (SMEs). More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic showed clearly that digital tools are essential to ensure the continuity of business operations and interactions with authorities on company law related issues.
While Directive (EU) 2019/1151 on the use of digital tools and processes in company law (Digitalisation Directive) provided the first step in advancing digital tools and procedures in company law (e.g. by providing for fully online creation of companies, registration of branches and filing with business registers) and is currently being transposed, there is more to be done.
In this context, the new initiative on “Upgrading digital company law” aims to further adapt EU company law to the continuing digital developments. This initiative will represent the second step in the digitalisation of company law and will build on and complement the 2019 Digitalisation Directive. This public consultation aims to give all citizens and organisations the opportunity to inform policy development.
It will collect data and views of stakeholders on the problems to be addressed, as well as on policy options and their potential impacts. It does not cover online company law procedures regulated by the Digitalisation Directive, questions of reuse and open data (regulated by Directive (EU) 2019/1024) and the Commission proposal aiming to establish a European single access point providing centralised access to publicly available information of relevance to financial services, capital markets and sustainability.
Responding to the questionnaire
You can contribute to this consultation by filling in the online questionnaire. If you are unable to use the online questionnaire, please contact us using the email address below.
Questionnaires are available in some or all official EU languages. You can submit your responses in any official EU language.
For reasons of transparency, organisations and businesses taking part in public consultations are asked to register in the EU’s Transparency Register.
Personal data and privacy statement
The European Union is committed to protecting your personal data and to respecting your privacy. When carrying out public consultations we adhere to the policy on ‘protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data by the Community institutions’, based on Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 on processing of personal data by the EU institutions.
Further information on the protection of your personal data
Contact: just-cleg@ec.europa.eu