Online shareholders meeting, Experts "read" the difficulty for businesses
Although recorded the meeting format of the general meeting of shareholders (Shareholder Meeting) online is a business direction to take into account if the deadline for meeting this year is nearing the end of the year 30/6 next, but the disease situation has not been completely pushed back, Experts "read" the difficulties that businesses need to note when forced to choose this type of meeting.
As usual, month 4 The annual meeting season is the annual meeting when most businesses choose this time to hold the meeting. But, this year, due to the negative impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, so many businesses have not been able to conduct a AGM, but must request an extension until the last minute is on 30/6 next. The question is if it is near the "red limit". 30/6 that the epidemic situation is not being pushed back completely, there is a risk that the enterprise will be in the situation of violating the law by not holding the General Meeting of Shareholders on time?
In that context, according to expert opinion, with the applicable law, Businesses need to plan an online meeting of shareholders. Leading international experience, Ms. Ha Thu Thanh, Chairman of the Board of Deloitte Vietnam Company shared, The organization of an online shareholder meeting is not new in many countries.
In America, The online meeting of General Assembly of Shareholders is quite popular. In the current context, as of the month 4/2020, in some countries like: Brother, Virtue, Canada, Singapore…, There have been many businesses conducting online shareholder meeting.
By online technology, The General Meeting of Shareholders can be held below 2 format: Complete online meeting (virtual only-meeting), in which no member meets face to face; and a partial online meeting (hybrid meeting) With the participation of some members present in a specific location and set up online for other members in this meeting to participate..
In fact, The way to hold online shareholder meeting will bring many benefits for businesses such as promoting companies to innovate, technology applications; Increase the ability to mobilize shareholders to participate – This is especially suitable for companies, Multinational corporations; Cost savings compared to face-to-face meetings (Including hall rental cost, print documents, human resources for the meeting ...).
However, to implement the online shareholder meeting, Besides, this content needs to be added to the corporate governance regulations such as: Regulations, Regulation on corporate governance, Ms. Thanh pointed out the challenges that enterprises need to note. Whereby, The biggest challenge in online meetings is ensuring the effectiveness of the chairman's responses to discussions and debates..
The shareholder's questions will be sent in the form of electronic questions in large volume with the status of "anonymity '', so it will be difficult for the chairman to decide which sentence to answer. Therefore, may not satisfy shareholders' requests with questions, especially conundrums, "Sensitive".
Another challenge is the difficulty in predicting the outcome of the meeting. Online meeting means more shareholders participate in the meeting. In a certain range, Voting numbers may be changed in real time, Shareholders do not exercise the authorization of voting, so it's harder to predict the outcome.
Information technology issues such as technical errors, connection speed ... may occur causing a delay, even completely paralyze an online meeting.
Businesses also need to consider what to do if shareholders object to the organization of online meetings, because in fact this has happened before.
“Full online shareholder meeting (Virtual AGM): The entire meeting model is conducted in cyberspace, allow shareholders to directly grasp the entire content, conference proceedings. Whereby, Shareholders hear the report from the company's management and are provided with the means to express their opinions, Ask questions at the meeting via chat. Besides, The voting and election of shareholders is recorded in real time on the online system.
The AGM sells online: This is a "hybrid model" combining the traditional shareholder meeting model with virtual shareholder meeting. This model allows shareholders to choose to participate in meetings directly at the venue which has been notified by invitation of the business., or may not attend but still vote, vote online and track the progress of the congress through a live broadcast link that is specifically granted access to that shareholder.“
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