No provision of the DGCL precludes the use of electronic notification today in addition to statutory notice. Thus, while stockholders previously could agree to receive proxy materials via e-mail or the Internet, the former state law requirement of providing notice of the meeting by mail has been solved. To be sure, as discussed more fully below, there are some practical matters that need to be worked out. The Staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission will be confronted with new issues regarding solicitations that do not end days before, but which potentially continue on into, the meeting itself. Moreover, there will be a new record-keeping problem.
Internet addresses are far more mobile than real estate.
Companies will need to establish programs to make sure that electronic addresses are current. Electronic Voting Electronic submission of proxies, by telephone or Internet, has been employed for several years by major public companies. A much smaller number of companies have experimented with broadcasting their annual meetings over the Internet. In order to permit remote attendance and participation, the corporation must put in place reasonable mechanisms to verify the identity of those attending and voting by remote communications and to record the results. Moreover, remote attending stockholders or proxies must be able to read or hear the meeting on a substantially concurrent basis, and have a reasonable opportunity to participate and vote despite their remote location.