EU Inc (the 28th regime) · 2026/0074(COD)
Supports the EU Inc. proposal as a necessary step to reduce fragmentation for startups and scaleups but wants to preserve core features, fix structural risks, and ensure enforceability.
Maintain the 48-hour incorporation timeline and €100 cost cap with binding timelines for tax and VAT registration, and ensure fully digital, fast, and standardised procedures without delays or extra costs from exceptions like notarial involvement.
“The 48-hour incorporation timeline and €100 cost cap are central to the proposal and must be maintained. To ensure this is effective in practice: tax identification (TIN) and VAT registration must be compatible with the 48-hour timeline; these processes should be subject to binding timelines, not best-efforts clauses; a maximum timeline (e.g. 5 working days from registration) should be introduced.”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 2
Ensure EU templates fully replace national formalities without additional checks and are commercially usable, covering multiple share classes, option pools, investor rights, convertible instruments, and resolutions.
“EU templates are essential to enabling speed and standardisation. When used they must fully replace national formalities and not be subject to additional national checks. They must also be commercially usable, not merely legally valid. This includes covering: multiple share classes, option pools and EU-ESO structures, standard investor rights, convertible or SAFE-like instruments, board and shareholder resolutions, share issuance and transfer documentation.”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 3
Preserve no minimum capital requirement, flexible capital structures with multiple share classes, and fast issuance tools aligned with venture capital practices; develop a standardised convertible instrument (EU-FAST).
“The proposal’s flexibility in financing should be preserved: no minimum capital requirement, flexible capital structures and multiple share classes, fast and simplified issuance tools aligned with venture capital practices. The Commission should also develop a standardised convertible instrument (EU-FAST).”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 3
Include multiple share classes, option pools, EU-ESO structures, standard investor rights, convertible instruments, and digital share registers and transfers in the EU templates to ensure practical usability.
Ensure employee stock options are fair, transparent, additional to salary, and accessible across borders without undermining labour protections; preserve existing worker participation rights at subsidiary level but avoid imposing automatic co-determination at holding level or highest national standards across all EU Inc. companies.
Avoid linking incorporation to a single place of operations, management, or economic activity; allow freedom of establishment with separate registered offices, headquarters, and operational presence across Member States; simplify cross-border seat transfers and reduce reliance on existing transformation mechanisms.
“EU Inc. should fully support the freedom of establishment within the Single Market, including the possibility to separate registered offices, headquarters, operational presence, and teams across different Member States... The proposal should therefore avoid introducing direct or indirect requirements linking incorporation to a single place of operations, management, or economic activity... Additional concerns include: the lack of simplified procedures for cross-border seat transfers; continued reliance on existing transformation mechanisms.”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 2
Keep EU Inc. as a Regulation to ensure a single, predictable EU-wide product and avoid fragmentation through national discretion.
“EU Inc. must remain a Regulation. Transforming it into a Directive or a national-label model would reintroduce fragmentation through national discretion. For founders and investors, the value of EU Inc. lies in being treated as a single, predictable EU-wide product, not as 27 national variants.”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 1
Maintain the Commission’s proposal on insolvency with simplified frameworks for faster winding-down and capital recycling, while continuing discussions on a coherent European approach to restructuring and second-chance entrepreneurship.
“On insolvency, AFS and ESN members broadly support simplified frameworks... AFS and ESN therefore support maintaining the Commission’s proposal as it stands at this stage. At the same time, the Commission should continue discussions with Member States on how to build a more coherent and innovation-friendly European approach to restructuring, insolvency and second-chance entrepreneurship.”
EU Inc. - Key Recommendations_AFS & ESN.pdf, page 6
On the files they lobby on: “…New European Innovation Agenda Digital Markets Act Digital Services Act 28th Regime / EU Inc.…”
Open source underneath
WhoShapedIt is a thin layer on open-source packages. Star them, fork them, build your own micro.
Open-source context and state for AI: it keeps only what matters for the question.
In WhoShapedIt: Reads every lobby submission and position paper and each official text, cut into passages, and judges each passage against nine questions (who can use EU Inc, workers on the board, tax…), so every ask and every step is read on the passages that address it.
Open-source Svelte components for clean, accessible interfaces.
In WhoShapedIt: The status, the timeline, the theme picker, the camps of lobbies and the organisation pages.
Also built with SvelteKit · Vercel AI SDK · Zod