Canada
Does a Canadian company need an EU representative?
Canada's partial adequacy decision covers transfers, not representation. What Canadian SaaS, AI and consumer brands need before selling into the European Union.
The pitfall
Partial adequacy, read too broadly
Canada holds a partial adequacy decision, covering commercial organisations subject to PIPEDA. It is a real advantage, and it is regularly over-read. Adequacy means personal data may flow from the Union to Canada without additional transfer safeguards. It does not mean the GDPR stops applying to a Canadian organisation that offers goods or services to people in the Union or monitors their behaviour, and it does not answer whether a representative must be designated under Article 27.
Quebec's Law 25 raises the same question in another form. It moved Quebec closer to European standards in several respects, which makes parity easy to assume. Similarity of approach is not the same as satisfying a separate obligation under a separate instrument.
Working in French
For Quebec organisations there is a practical point: we work in French as readily as in English, and correspondence with Belgian and European authorities is handled locally in French or Dutch as required.
Scope
Services most likely to apply
- GDPR Article 27 representation
- AI Act authorised representative
- SaaS and technology contracts under EU law
- EU trade mark filing
- EU responsible person for consumer brands
Working together
The role of your existing Canadian counsel
Your current advisers keep the relationship and the strategy. We take the European-side mandate and report back in English. Where you would rather we deal with the company directly, we do that instead — it is settled before we start, not afterwards.
For foreign law firmsPreparation
What to prepare before we speak
Your privacy notice. Your record of processing, if one exists. A description of the activity that reaches the Union. The Member States you target. Whether any EU entity, importer or reseller already exists. And whatever prompted the question — a customer questionnaire, a marketplace notice, a letter from an authority.
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Start with a scope review
EU market entry assessmentThis page describes how these obligations generally work. Whether one applies to you depends on facts a web page cannot capture — your supply chain, your contracts and the role you actually play in them.