One of the leading Ethereum Blockchain consortiums just got a bit stronger. Yesterday, Aug 14, the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) announced the addition of 14 new members to its Legal Industry Working Group.
Eleven leading law firms and three academic institutions, including the Cardozo Law School, Duke Center on Law & Technology, and the Department of Legal Studies and Business Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, entered the Group to help evolve Ethereum into an enterprise-grade technology.
They will do this by providing R&D in a range of areas including privacy, confidentiality, scalability, and security.
Along with the prestigious academic institutions, the law firms that have partnered include Cooley, Debevoise & Plimpton, Goodwin, Hogan Lovells, Holland & Knight, Jones Day, Latham & Watkins, Morrison & Foerster, Perkins Coie and Shearman & Sterling.
Enterprise-grade Ethereum applications
With increased interest in Blockchain from legal professionals, the EEA sees this move as critical to building enterprise-grade Ethereum applications that are legally compliant in the future.
According to Aaron Wright, the Chair of the EEA Legal Industry Working Group, Associate Clinical Professor and Co-Director of the Cardozo Law School’s Blockchain Project, and co-founder of the smart contract project OpenLaw:
“Lawyers are poised to serve as the catalysts for Blockchain technology, and the Legal Working Group will serve as a neutral space to explore blockchain-based legal technology, develop standards for “smart” legal agreements, support emerging enterprise use cases, and tackle important policy issues raised by this new impactful technology.”
Going forward, legally compliant smart contracts will be of the utmost importance, as regulations catch up with Blockchain technology, and enterprise-grade applications become more widespread.
The 14 law firms and academic institutions will align with some of the world’s largest and most important companies including some of those listed below. At present, there are over 150 members in the alliance.