MWCapital and the ICAB are to encourage digital transformation in the legal sector

• These two organisations have signed an agreement covering the active promotion of the Digital Future Society programme, a project that seeks to turn Barcelona into the headquarters of a major international technology innovation forum.
• The agreement will also reinforce the initiative led by the Barcelona Bar Association (ICAB), with the support of MWCapital and numerous other institutions, for the drafting of the Charter of Citizens’ Rights in the Digital Era

September 19, 2018

Mobile World Capital Barcelona (MWCapital) and the Barcelona Bar Association (ICAB) have today signed an agreement to collaborate on promoting digital transformation in the legal sector. The impact of digitalisation on the legal profession is a fait accompli and the development of initiatives to promote digitalisation a reality. Against this background, the agreement between the two institutions will encourage different initiatives to continue transforming the sector and to help grasp the new technological and digital reality in the legal sector.

The initiatives proposed involve both organisations’ commitment to the development of the Digital Future Society programme. The project, which arose under the auspices of MWCapital, seeks to turn Barcelona into the headquarters of a major international technology innovation forum at which the social challenges posed by technological and digital transformation will be discussed.MWCapital will also provide its experience and knowledge in drafting the Charter of Citizens’ Rights in the Digital Era, an initiative that seeks -amongst other things- to convert Barcelona into the world capital for Digital Rights and into the European benchmark in this area. Although society’s digital transformation brings with it numerous advantages, it also entails a series of risks concerning people’s fundamental rights such as the right to privacy and the right to honour. There is therefore a need for work on new legislation that covers technological transformation and guarantees citizen’s rights, also in the digital sector.

According to Carlos Grau, CEO of MWCapital, this agreement “establishes a new context for the digitalisation of the legal profession and enables us to embark upon joint initiatives to encourage the process”. Grau also stated that “future customers require digital lawyers who can accompany them in this new scenario and we should be prepared for that. Hence the importance of this agreement that seeks not only to develop initiatives, but also, above all, to make this new reality comprehensible.”

Mª Eugènia Gay, Dean of the ICAB, meanwhile underlines that the agreement with the MWCapital Foundation “is necessary and essential in order to establish the rules for the digital transformation of the sector and to grasp a new legal reality in a technological and digitalised environment. Guaranteeing citizens’ right to defence in the digital age also is one of our primary objectives as an institution that seeks to ensure that the legal profession performs properly in Barcelona.”