Policy – OpenCorporates

Von der Leyen’s “EU Inc” calls for speed, but the underlying data infrastructure is still catching up

On Tuesday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen made a passionate pitch for European competitiveness. Speaking on the new "EU Inc" proposal to simplify cross-border business, she offered a soundbite that was clearly meant to inspire: "If we get this right — and if we move fast enough — this will not only help EU companies grow. But it will attract investment from across the world."

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February 2, 2026

UK Companies House Strategic Intelligence Assessment: A wake-up call for company registers everywhere

Yesterday, Companies House published their first strategic intelligence assessment. If I'm completely honest, I was rather blown away by it.

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October 25, 2024

Community / Data / Impact / Policy

Company registers: Why penalties do and don’t matter

Last week, the Business Registry Insights group published a fascinating report on penalties issued by legal entity registers around the world. This is, admittedly, a bit wonkish, but at OpenCorporates we are proud to be wonkish about legal entity register data (in fact, a working definition of wonkish could be - unsexy details that matter relating to an unsexy but important subject).

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October 23, 2024

Community / Data / Impact / Policy

2024: a pivotal year for legal entity data

Significant shifts are happening in the accessibility and scope of company-registry data around the world. In this first of a series of ‘state-of-the nations’ articles, we explore developments in Canada and how it can lose its reputation for “snow-washing”

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March 27, 2024

Community / Data / Impact / Policy

This must be the wakeup call for true corporate transparency

The Bell Tower of Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv, taken on my visit to the city in August 2017, on a trip to help with the creation of a Beneficial Ownership…

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March 9, 2022

Community / Impact / Policy

Is this a fork in the road for EU company data?

8 years ago, OpenCorporates surveyed access to official company register data in the EU. To our knowledge, this was the first time that this had been done in a systematic…

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June 10, 2020

Policy

OECD Anti-Corruption & Integrity Forum: Can AML survive in a fireflies world?

We are entering a world where there will be an explosion in the number, speed and complexity of companies, brought about by companies being incorporated by computer programs. Like the…

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March 5, 2020

Policy

Unlocking US company data: Washington forges ahead where others lag behind

The US is the most important and vibrant business market in the world. Yet fundamental information about the millions of companies powering its economy is very hard to access as…

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January 29, 2020

Data / Policy

5AMLD launches: close but no cigar

The EU’s Fifth Anti-Money Laundering Directive (5AMLD) came into force last week, on 10 January 2020. It was partly a response to the Panama Papers, a leak of thousands of…

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January 16, 2020

Corporate Structure / Policy / Trust

Meet our trustees: John Githongo

Last summer, OpenCorporates announced the creation of the OpenCorporates Trust, the entity that guarantees OpenCorporates’ public-benefit mission, and ensures we always operate to open up company data for the public…

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October 16, 2019