Many associations are planning to hold their Annual General Meeting (AGM) in the coming months. Due to health risks, they are now faced with the prospect of either postponing those meetings or holding them virtually.
https://www.smartkarma.com/home/corporates/corporate-solutions-virtual-agm/
“The Annual General Meeting (AGM) is a regulatory obligation and a necessary milestone, as shareholders are called upon to vote on important issues that require their approval, from the appointment of directors to key business decisions. With people turning to video-chatting solutions for both personal and business cases due to COVID-19 restrictions, the next logical step for issuers is to try to hold their AGM online. But this might be easier said than done.“- Smartkarma
Before proceeding with planning your virtual AGM you should first confirm if your bylaws, and the governing federal or provincial legislation (e.g. the CBCA, BC Societies Act, etc.) allow the AGM to be held electronically or requires that it be held in person.
https://zeroceiling.org/our-first-online-agm-what-we-learned/
“We’ve been adapting to the “new normal” in all sorts of ways over the last six weeks. And one thing we had to figure out pretty quickly: how do we hold our AGM in this new online world? Our AGM was scheduled for April 14, and we’d been looking forward to catching up with our supporters at our Open House.”-ZeroCeiling
If your company is considering a move to a virtual AGM, you will need a solution which fulfills the following requirements:
- Full image and sound broadcast of the entire event
- Digital transmission of proxies up until online voting
- Secure authentication process
- Prior to the meeting: sending electronic access data to shareholders so they can access the online shareholder portal
- Option to send questions in text form via digital communication channels which can then be read out and answered by the board.
