The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) and ELI jointly organised a roundtable which took place on 19 Marc 2026 to discuss the use of digital assistants in and for contracting purposes as well as the development of model contract terms in and related to automated contracting. These topics cut across a broad spectrum of legal and policy fields, including contract and consumer law, regulatory design, technological innovation, and market practice.
The BEUC-ELI Roundtable brought together key stakeholders, including policy-makers, legislators, regulators, legal practitioners, consumer advocates, civil society and industry representatives, to engage in a meaningful dialogue on these issues, and to explore potential legislative avenues for enhancing legal certainty and transparency in this rapidly evolving area.
The Roundtable featured presentations by the following experts:
- Teresa Rodríguez de las Heras Ballell (ELI President; ELI Project Co-Reporter of the ELI DACC Model Rules; Full Professor of Commercial Law)
- Patrycja Gautier (The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC))
- Urs Buscke (The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC))
- Christoph Busch (Professor of Law, University of Osnabrück; Co-Reporter of the ELI DACC Model Rules)
- Dirk Staudenmayer (Head of Unit for Contract Law of the Directorate-General Justice and Consumers at the European Commission)
- Jae Sung Lee (Principal Legal Officer, The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL))
- Alexander William Kunzelmann (Legal Officer, The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL))
- Ilya Bruggeman (Director for Digital, Single Market & Consumer Policy at EuroCommerce) – IB
- Gabriel Lopez (Senior Director of Regulatory Affairs and Institutional Relations, Microsoft; Vice-Chair to the AI Policy Commission for Asociación Multisectorial de Empresas de Tecnologías de la Información, Comunicaciones y Electrónica (AMETIC))
- Louise Beltzung (Consumer Policy Officer Austrian Chamber of Labour (AK Vienna))
