How to share legal entity information with stakeholders in 2 steps?

│ Software review for data-driven corporate housekeeping in collaboration with Corporify │

Corporate governance requires collaboration among stakeholders, including C-level executives, legal and tax advisors, compliance professionals, investment managers, and others. Traditionally, information is shared through email or a public workspace in the organization, which is neither practical nor secure. Instead, controlling access to information is good practice, just like providing data in a visually attractive and user-friendly way.

Let’s dive into the practicalities and discover how the legal entity platform currently under review tackles these challenges.

Editor’s note: Belgian legaltech provider Corporify recently asked InvestCEE to prepare a detailed overview of their cloud-based legal entity management and corporate housekeeping solution. Part 1 of the Corporify software review series focused on capturing corporate legal data in a single source of truth for all stakeholders. Part 2 focused on driving corporate efficiency with workflow automation and reporting. This is Part 3 of the articles series that is dedicated to collaboration with stakeholders, IT integration capabilities and system security. InvestCEE software reviews focus only on legal technology vendors and products that we believe demonstrate quality, thoughtfulness, responsiveness, and legal innovation. 

Step 1: Use a Data Portal for Stakeholders

Lawyers and compliance professionals are key players when it comes to legal entity management in international operations. Yet their tasks in the back-end need to be carefully aligned with various stakeholders, such as:

• Legal teams to coordinate requirements under various local and international laws,
• Compliance auditors to stay on top of regulatory risks across jurisdictions,
• Directors and business managers to align with the strategic objectives of the group while accessing up-to-date corporate data,
• Finance professionals to keep tax and financial considerations under control, and
• All parties to track and exchange corporate information and so to ensure a coherent legal and business structure for the entire group.

Traditionally, information is shared by sending documents through email or by uploading documents to a cloud service. This method of sharing is not ideal because it is:

1. Unsecure: documents are not always encrypted to the highest standards
2. Uncontrollable: it is difficult to control who has access to documents
3. Unpractical: stakeholders want to quickly find the information they need quickly, rather than searching in their email inboxes and folders

To address these challenges, Corporify has developed a portal that ensures secure, controlled, and user-friendly access to information:

• Secure: documents are stored on encrypted, single-tenant servers, providing the best level of data protection
• Controlled: you can easily decide which information to share with whom and keep track of who accesses what
• User-friendly: Corporify’s portal is designed to be intuitive and easy to use for all types of stakeholders, ensuring efficient and straightforward information retrieval.

A dual solution

Corporify is a dual solution for managing corporate governance:

1. Platform: a robust system for efficiently managing legal entities
2. Portal: a connected interface providing stakeholders access to information about your legal entities

This integrated approach was specifically designed to help tackle the most burning challenges of international legal entity management:

➤ Regulatory compliance: each jurisdiction has its own set of laws and regulations that business entities must adhere to. Navigating these different statutory landscapes can be a daunting task. With Corporify, legal and compliance teams can cooperate in managing regulatory risks for all group entities on a single platform.

➤ Cross-border transactions: mergers and acquisitions, share and asset transfers, financing projects and reorganizations often involve complex legal and financial considerations, such as transfer pricing or various statutory filing and publication tasks. With Corporify, financial teams are better placed to coordinate all transfer related obligations on a shared platform.

➤ Stakeholder communication and engagement: different stakeholders need to obtain information about your legal entities. Corporify offers an easy-to-use platform where stakeholders can get access to information they need while administrators can control who accesses what.

InvestCEE insight #1: Digital corporate housekeeping has become a “packaged service” for legal, compliance, tax and financial advisors who offer corporate clients a niche solution for risk management and data governance.

Step 2: Integrate with your other applications

To optimize international business activities, centralizing corporate data is a key strategy. A central database ensures that all necessary information is readily available and up-to-date for all stakeholders.

However, data flow across existing and newly adopted systems is just as important: a carefully designed integration plan enables even more efficiency within the group.

With this in mind, Corporify developed its documented open REST API to allow end-user organizations to build their own integrations and thereby connect Corporify to any other platform. Their flexible REST API can be used to fit Corporify seamlessly into any pre-existing workflows.

As part of the standard service offering, Corporify ensures out-of-the-box integrations with solutions such as Connective, DocuSign, Adobe Sign, MS Azure and Okta. These readily available integrations allow users to get Corporify up and running faster by simply connecting with their already existing IT solutions.

While a standard integration will work well for some organizations, others may need a tailored solution, something more customized for their pre-existing IT architecture or a specific piece of development.

It needs to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but it is good to know that the customer team also offers on-demand support to link the Corporify platform with any existing IT systems. If you’re curious for more details on integrations and the difference between your options, feel free to schedule a brainstorming session with the team:

Finally, data import and migration is a specific use case when it comes to enabling a smooth transition to new IT solutions. The Corporify team knows first-hand that successful software migrations rely heavily upon the quality of the data you’re working with. That’s why they have a team of highly educated and experienced legal and IT professionals available for dedicated client service.

IT Security: Keeping Corporate Data Safe

Corporate governance means working with an organization’s most precious data on a daily basis. Hence these workstreams are entrusted with professional teams that operate at the highest ethical standards.

Certainly, any IT solutions involved in this process must comply with the same requirements. Security-by-design is a necessary minimum for any technology solution dedicated to legal entity management.

Following these fundamental principles, Corporify was developed with a privacy first approach and offers the following security features:

➤ Single tenant cloud application & encryption – users access a private cloud with an encrypted database. Any data on Corporify is always encrypted, both during transfer and at rest. Note: only authorized users will be able to access the corporate data kept in Corporify, in each case strictly depending on organizational policy and predefined user roles.

➤ ISO27001 certified data centers – Corporify’s data centers are located in Belgium and the Netherlands (both primary and back-up databases). Upon request, data centers can be set up in the Americas and APAC regions, as well. Note: Corporify runs regular back-ups while using the latest techniques to ensure client data is secure at all times.

➤ Audit trail & tamper-proof securities’ and mandates register – for Corporify, transparency is an essential building block of trusted business relations. Note: in addition to indicating the most recent activities on the platform, Corporify also provides on-demand activity logs of all performed actions, including historical data.

➤ Multi-factor login authentication – in order to keep client data safe and secure, Corporify enables admins users to enforce multiple two-factor authentication policies. Note: Corporify is integrated with various authenticator apps such as MS Azure AD and Okta.

➤ Frequent pen tests – the platform is regularly tested for any system failures or compromises. Note: a recent penetration test even showed that Corporify is safer than most online banking apps.

➤ Service Level Agreements – the Corporify SaaS service offers different levels of user support. Feel free to also inquire about the applicable SLA’s when requesting a product demo. Note: Corporify policies are designed to ensure that client data stays safe under any and all circumstances.

Being based in the heart of Europe, Corporify is obviously fully compliant with GDPR. When registering for a product demo tour, feel free to ask for the DPO’s involvement who will gladly answer any questions with regards to Corporify’s data and privacy policies.

InvestCEE insight #2: Data-conscious corporate governance means taking full control over access rights and user roles, thus setting clear rules about who can edit legal data or view information stored in the encrypted private cloud.

Conclusion

Team collaboration, carefully designed IT architecture and cybersecurity have all been hot topics over the last several years. Indeed, optimizing legal entity management requires a unique set of soft skills and carefully integrated technology solutions. For business groups operating on an international scale, digital corporate governance has become a much needed shift from manual spreadsheets to an encrypted data portal accessible to their stakeholders and advisors.

InvestCEE LegalTech Consultancy is nurturing an ecosystem of curated tools and services, we advise and assist from vendor selection to implementation. Opt in for a product tour of Corporify to test key features or get in touch for a free brainstorming to get started. You can also just submit any questions below and we’ll get back to you: