Digital transformation of modern corporation management tools: the current state and development paths

The subject. Digital technologies have been integrated into all aspects of public life, including politics, law, finance, business, education, science, and society. Yet, digitalization exerts an even greater impact on the economy, which should prompt the State, represented by its legislative and executive bodies, to take timely action to ensure the legal regulation of diverse aspects of the digital economy. Digital transformation of the economy has redefined the approaches to the issues of legal capacity, corporate governance and management of business processes. Traditional management mechanisms are no longer competitive, unless used in conjunction with dynamically developing digital technologies.

This article explores the issues related to digital legal personality of a corporation (online registration (e-residency) of corporations and the digital footprint that companies leave in public registers), digital corporate governance, and discuss the operation of digital corporations, including networked and decentralized autonomous organizations. The authors distinguish three types of digital corporate governance: remote management (exercised by human individuals), smart management (based on algorithms designed by human engineers), and artificial intelligence (AI) management (that does not require human involvement). Some tools of digital corporation management are illustrated, replacing traditional forms of management of the human cognitive system. Finally, we provide an overview of the operational characteristics of decentralized autonomous organizations.

Purpose of the research. This article is devoted to the transformation of management tools for modern corporations in the digital economy. In order to comply with the Russian corporate legislation of the existing digital reality, it is necessary to develop a comprehensive scientific and legal concept of corporate governance, ensuring the balance and protection of the rights and legitimate interests of all participants in corporate relations and others related to corporate relations, as well as increasing the transparency and efficiency of corporations.

Methodology. The methodology of this study was based on the following methods of scientific knowledge: general scientific empirical methods (observation (over the course of development of the use of digital technologies in corporate law), comparison (of the effectiveness of the use of digital technologies in corporate law of different countries)); methods of theoretical knowledge (analysis (of advantages and disadvantages of digitalization of individual institutions of corporate law), formal legal method (in the formulation and research of various concepts, determination of their characteristics and classification), theoretical modeling (of the prospects and areas of possible application of digital technologies in corporate law).

The main results. Digitalization of corporate management is bound to increase business profitability and improve competitiveness on the market. We believe that in the coming years science will have to tackle the issues of assessing the implications of the introduction of digital technologies, determining technical, economic and legal prerequisites for their implementation, and identifying their limits. In addition, issues related to professional training / retraining of personnel capable of working with modern technologies are of importance.

Conclusions. The authors came to the conclusion that the main direction of improving corporate legislation in the context of digitalization is currently the creation and provision of conditions for effective interaction between corporate actors and persons directly associated with them in the digital environment.

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