theJurists Europe

THEJURISTSE U R O P E

theJurists Europe - businessplan - a publication by deJuristen bvba - june 2014.

The ambitionTO INTRODUCE EUROPE TO A NEW WAY OF LOOKING AT LAW

The ideasTHAT LED TO TAKING THEFIRST AMBITIOUS STEPS

The storyBEHIND THE SUCCESS OF THE

BELGIAN PILOT-PROJECT

“The difference between an idea and a plan is the same as the difference between a story and a fact.”

THEJURISTS EUROPE - THIS IS OUR PLAN.

Prelude

When I first enrolled at law school, my biggest dream was to one day run a traditional law firm, just like the famous big firms out there. I wanted to service the biggest companies around, with traditional legal material that only a few would understand.

However, as my education and ambition progressed, I began to obtain a more critical look on, our law systeman, and more generally, the world. I realized that trying to be one of them wasn’t the way forward. I became convinced that I dind’t want to blend in, I wanted to stand out.

People today aren’t really fond of law, and that has his obvious reasons. I believe one of the main influences of the succes of traditional lawyers is the fact that they have a monopoly on the legal market today. I wanted to break this monopoly and bring something fresh. That’s when I came up with deJuristen, a firm of specialized jurists, not lawyers, trying to look for solutions, not prob-lems. The success we’ve expierenced in Belgium during the first couple of years was pretty over-whelming. In less then 4 years we had to move our business to Brussels and we’re continuously hiring new ambitious and like-minded people.

Today, I feel like I know how to position myself in the market, I feel like people know what we do, and above all why our clients appreciate the fact that we’re different. That’s why I want to bring my ideas to something bigger than just Belgium. I want theJurists to discover Europe, and Europe to discover theJurists.

That’s why, I am exicited, proud and cheerful to unfold my plans for theJurists Europe.

Matthias Dobbelaere-Welvaert. Managing Partner at theJurists Europe

PAGE 1


Why theJurists is doing great in Belgium

PAGE 2

THEJURISTS EUROPE - THIS IS OUR PLAN. PAGE 3

1. People don’t have faith in the classic legal system anymore.

2. Law needs to be fast, we are fast.

3. Our communication rocks.

4. We deliver quality.

5. We focus on customer satisfaction.

6. Our legal documents are waterproof, yet readable.

7. We think like entrepreneurs, not like lawyers. We look for solutions, not problems.

8. We’re young, we know what young IT-startups want. They don’t want boring lawyers.


Why theJurists works in Belgium

Let’s Explain.

PAGE 4

The classic legal system in Belgium has it’s defaults and it has had these same defaults for many years now. The biggest problem is the huge and annoying delays. File an ac-tion today and you can expect a ruling a couple of years from now. This is a big problem, definitely in the area of IT-law, an area that changes and shifts faster than light. The solution to this problem: us. We solve problems before they occur by writing waterproof legal documents and advising our clients in the best way possible. We don’t tell our clients what they expect or hope to hear, we tell them what’s best for them.

Of course, there are times clients approach us when it’s too late for a pro-active approach, a conflict-situation has come up. Again, when this is the case, we stay away from court-rooms. Not only because we’re not allowed to plead in court, but far more important, because it is our vast belief that there is always another way. It is always in both parties best interest to find a quick solution. This allows all parties to be able to get on with their business much faster, they will also save a lot of money. It’s never very difficult to convince both our client as well as the counterpart of this insight. Of all conflict-situations handeled by us over the last year, we only had to forward 2 cases to a court-lawyer. Extrajudicial solutions are the future: defenitly in the everchanging area of ICT-law.

A lot of law firms are trying very hard to look like a lot of law firms. They want to blend in. They choose a name consisted of the surnames of the founding partners, use a classical serif-font and setup a grey and boring website. We believe that’s not the way to go. Why would anyone want to blend in in an already saturated and inefficient market. We would rather stand-out. That’s why we think out of the box. We wanted to call our company something that wasn’t commonplace, yet very clear: THEJURISTS, perfect right?

On top of that, our logo looks like no-one else’s logo in our sec-tor. People see us, they remember us, know we’re different. We like to keep this same principle in mind when thinking about our brand-communication. Social media, unlike any other law firm in Belgium, is extremely important to us. With a facebook page with over 1400 fans, all of which organically grown, we’re absolute top of our class in Belgium. Also, questions asked on twitter by our (potential) clients are always answered within 24 hours. We feel this is highly appreciated by the public.


Not an empty box

PAGE 5

We also love to keep a finger on the pulse of the topicallity. When something even remotely related to our area of expertise makes it to the news, we always write a readable opinion on our website (which is visited very often). Our opinions have a very high reach and are very often picked up in national me-dia. That’s why we’re also top of mind for many me-dia-channels for anything ICT/IP-related. VTM, VRT, De Tijd, De Morgen, Datanews, Bloovi, et cetera. As soon as something’s moving, they call us. This allows us to achieve great exposure, it’s also a way to build up credibillity, and thus a solid client-base.

Of course, communication without a quality product is nothing but an empty box. No matter how beautiful the box may be, if she’s empty, it won’t work on the long term. That’s the reason why we put a lot of effort in recruiting people that not only fit in our company’s philosophy, but are also great at what they do. We dare say that all of our legal documents, our advice, our IP-protection is absolutely top-notch. It takes a lot of energy to find and train employees in such way that all the work is exce-cuted nicely, but on the long term, it pays off. No doubt.

In the end, what matters most to us is that our client is happy. Not only because we’re so kind-hearted that we like to see people happy (trust us, we are…) but also because a happy customer is the best billboard one can imagine. The number of clients we get through mouth-to-mouth advertising is immense. In times where unsatisfied customers can express their dissatisfaction

so easy and and with a big reach, no company can af-ford to leave a client unhappy. This works in both ways of course. A happy customer tweeting about how good we are is a very important aspect of our businessplan. Again: the combination of exposure and credibility.

One of the things people really hate about lawyers is the language they use. You read a letter written by a lawyer and you’re confused after the first two sentences. No one uses these words. So why would we? We want our documents to be readable to the end-user. Since a lot of our clients focus on e-commerce, trust is a very important factor. The best way to obtain trust is by transparency. Writing terms and conditions, privacy statements and disclaimers no one can read isn’t very transparant, so we don’t do that.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we compromise in terms of legal waterproofing. Once again, finding the right people is the key to succes here: people that can combine solid legal writing with a readable style of writing aren’t very frequent, but we find them.

Entrepreneurs build the future. We love this, which is why we like to think of ourselves as entrepreneurs as well. Sometimes the solution to a problem can be very obvious and non-juridical. By thinking outside the box, we can also offer our clients solutions like these. We also offer our expertise in the fields of marketing, communication and social media. In combination with our legal skills, this is something pretty unique.

So, to sum things up: we’re young, we think like our clients and with our clients, we’re good at what we do and… we’re awesome. That’s why theJurists is doing great in Belgium and it will work in the rest of Europe as well.


Why we can export theJurists to Europe

PAGE 6


Why we can export theJurists to Europe

PAGE 7

1. Europe is the future.

2. We’re ahead of things, Europe is ahead of things.

3. We’re great at recruiting the right people.

4. IT/IP law is harmonized accross Europe.

5. We’re from Brussels.

6. We have the experience.

7. We can provide a complete framework.

8. We’re confident entrepreneurs.


Let’s kick things off with an understatement: Europe is the future. Nations are a thing of the past. With the attendance of the internet and social media, borders fade. It’s easy to have a friendship with someone who’s over a thousand miles away, so why wouldn’t it be possible to do business with someone from a different country?

The Belgian plan, implemented in the

European Union


Most of the trans-European projects that succeed have one thing in common: they’re ahead of things. We strongly believe we’re ahead of things as well, so we strongly believe our project will succeed. The main key to succes in the whole theJurists Europe project will be to find the right people. Since it will be impossible for us to be everywhere all the time, we will have to put a lot of trust in those responsible for our brand abroad. Finding the right people for the job will be our most important task if we want the whole project to work. Luckily, finding the right people is something we tend to be really good at. Of course, if we would provide our services in the area of for example family-law, tax-law or labor-law, things would be a lot more complicated since every member state has it’s own specific legislation. In the area of IP/ICT-law this isn’t the case. 90% of the applicable legislation is issued on a European level, which means the legislation is largely harmonized across Europe. This means it’s easy for us to train the new employees, we can use the experience we gathered in Belgium to explain how things work across Europe.

Having our main office in the capital of Europe will of course help as well. The number of companies who hold their main (European) office in Brussels is uncountable. Not only are almost all of the most important European political institutions situated in Brussels, the city also is one of the most important traffic intersections in Europe, making it the ideal place for a big business to hold it’s offices. Since we have the ambition of becoming

a pretty large business enterprise, we feel like we’re in the right place at the heart of the European Union.

After having worked in the sector for a little over four years now, we think we know what our potential clients are looking for. Not only do they want the service they’re looking for fast and understandable, they also want the persons providing the service to be easily approachable, and they want a lot of information, very accessable. These are just a couple of examples of things we like to provide. For example, by building a very user-friend-ly website, we feel we can reduce the gap between the agency and the client. This has a huge positive impact on the trust the client puts in the office, of course.

By providing what we like to call a complete framework, we can put the new offices across Europe in a very privileged situation right from the start. They’ll be able to compete with established values right from the start, because we’ll compensate the possible lack of experience with our own experience and new and innovative tools of communication.

There are two characteristics that define almost every succesful enterpreneur: they are confident, and incredibly stubborn. We like to believe that we possess both qualities. We’re confident the project will work, and if it not immediatly, we’ll keep trying until it does!

Ready for Europe

“We’re in the right place at the heart of Europe.”


Don’t take our word for it...

Our clients testimonanials

McDonalds

Samsung Electronics

Legal framework for their mobile application

Implementation of the new cookie regulation

theJurists were asked to draft the Terms of Use, Privacy Statements, and other relevant legal documents for their brand new mobile application. The aim was to provide transparency and clarity, both in the recognizable placement of legal texts, as in the wording. When the user for the first time opens the application, he gets a readable overview of the rights and obligations associated with the application. McDonald’s Belgium must therefore rank as an example, when it comes to legal transparency within a mobile application. Respect for the rights and privacy of the user is of course an additional reason to download and trust the application.

theJurists were asked to draft the cookie and cookie policy statement for the English (.be / en) and French-language website (.be / fr) to edit. The aim was to transparency and clarity, both in the placement of legal texts, as in the words. The banner at the top provides a transparent view into the cookie policy of the Belgian Samsung website. The website also obtained the legal quality ‘mylabel’. For the Dutch market Samsung.nl website was addressed by our friends at ICTRecht.nl, partner of deJuristen. The new cookie policy of Samsung Electronics also obtained the legal quality ‘mylabel’, after careful review and drafting of legal documents.


E-ON

Omega Pharma

Drafting all legal documents for their website

Trademark Portfolio Monitoring

E.ON AG is a German energy producing and supplying company that serves over 30 million customers worldwide, with headquarters in Düsseldorf. It is one of the largest utilities in the world, with strong market positions in the European gas and electricity markets theJurists were asked to draft the cookie and cookie policy statement for the Dutch, French and English website. We also updated various other legal documents. The aim was to transparency and clarity, both in the place-ment of legal texts, as in the words. The banner at the top provides a transparent view into the cookie policy of the Belgian EON website.

Omega Pharma is a Belgian Pharmaceutical company, founded in 1987 by Marc Coucke (born 1965) and Yvan Vindevogel, both former Pharmacy students at the Ghent University. The company has a yearly revenue of €878.7 million. theJurists were asked to draft the all relevant legal documents for their first webshop, fo-cussing on sport supplements (Etixx). The aim was to provide transparency and clarity, both in the placement of legal texts, as in the words. We’ve succeeded. We were honoured to be part of their first e-commerce adventure.


how we will

ORGANIZEtheJurists Europe


PHASE 1: STARTUP

REMAIN ATPHASE 1

PHASE 2: PROFESSIONALIZE

TERMINATE OR REBOOT

EVALUATION


1. You’re a third year, or fourth year, law student.

2. You’re ambitious.

3. You are looking forward to start your own firm.

4. You want to earn money. Then again, who doesn’t?

5. You have a keen interest in ICT & IP Law.

6. You’re ready to meet a very new experience.

7. You want to be part of an European framework.

8. You can surprise with new ideas and teamspirit.

Who are we looking for?

Are you ready to stand out and make a difference in this ol legal world? Get in touch today. [email protected]

Documents

theJurists Europe