Rome II and Digital Products at the 2^nd Riga Private International Law Conference

On 22 June, Miss Yiolanti Maou, External Associate of the Procedural Law Unit and Adjunct Faculty at the School of Law, presented at the 2^nd Riga Private International Law Conference, organised by the Riga Graduate School of Law.

In its second year, the conference brought together academics and practitioners from across Europe to discuss the future of EU private international law, with a focus on the current reform initiatives concerning the Brussels and Rome Regulations.

Miss Maou’s presentation, ‘The Achilles Heel of Rome II: Article 5, ‘Marketing’, and Digital Products’, examined whether the concept of ‘marketing’, the connecting factor underpinning Article 5 of the Rome II Regulation, remains suitable for purely digital products distributed through decentralised channels.

Drawing on the examples of direct software downloads and app store distribution, her presentation argued that decentralised distribution no longer involves the country-by-country act of market entry that the concept of ‘marketing’ was originally designed to capture, highlighting the need for product liability choice-of-law reform in step with the substantive modernisation already underway in EU product liability and AI legislation.

The conference also featured presentations on core features of the Brussels and Rome Regulations, territoriality and digital relationships, overriding mandatory rules in the age of sanctions, and a SLAPP-aware private international law framework, reflecting the breadth of current reform debates across EU private international law.

Sincere thanks to the Riga Graduate School of Law and Dr Aleksandrs Fillers for convening the conference.