how to send a document for digital signature

As businesses across the globe race toward digital transformation, the demand for secure, compliant, and efficient electronic signature solutions continues to rise. Yet, with heightened international scrutiny around data localization laws and increasing complexity in legal frameworks—especially in Asia-Pacific—a one-size-fits-all approach to eSignature is beginning to falter. Adobe’s decision to exit mainland China’s e-signature market in 2024 is just one recent example illustrating how geopolitics and regional compliance imperatives are reshaping technology choices for enterprises.

While global providers still dominate the narrative in North America and Europe, organizations operating across Asia are increasingly seeking providers that align more closely with local regulations, offer full data residency, and deliver cost-effective deployment—without compromising technical standards like PKI encryption or long-term validation protocols.

The Technical Backbone of eSigning: Clarifying Definitions and Standards

A key confusion in the industry lies in the conflation between simple e-signatures and cryptographic digital signatures. From a compliance standpoint, especially under laws like eIDAS (EU), NIST (US), and the Electronic Signature Law in regions like Singapore and South Korea, the technical definition matters.

Simple e-signatures (SES), often image-based or click-based validations, are sufficient for low-risk agreements. They’re generally easier to implement and faster to scale. In contrast, cryptographic digital signatures leverage PKI (Public Key Infrastructure) architecture, incorporating elements such as digital certificates issued by a Certificate Authority (CA), key pairs, and audit trails. These signatures exhibit tamper-evident properties and are the preferred compliance method in most highly regulated jurisdictions, including financial services and cross-border B2B contracting.

Regulatory requirements also differ regionally: where the EU mandates Advanced or Qualified Electronic Signatures (QES) under eIDAS, Asian countries often follow local frameworks—such as ETSI standards in Japan or CA recognition mechanisms in South Korea. Providers must therefore offer not just technical readiness, but regulatory fluency.

Regional Service Providers: Global Brands and the Rise of Asian Alternatives

While industry awareness remains high around brands like Adobe Sign and DocuSign, changing global dynamics and localized service needs are opening space for providers tailored toward specific markets.

eSignGlobal: Designed for Asia-Pacific Compliance

Among the rising players, esignglobal stands out as a provider uniquely geared toward the regulatory and commercial realities of Asia. According to the MarketsandMarkets 2025 E-Signature Report, eSignGlobal marks the first Asian-founded provider to enter the global top 10 in market presence. Its growth across Southeast Asia, particularly in Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia, is driven by its ability to align with local certification authorities, support multi-language content, and offer data localization within national jurisdictions — something broader hyperscale providers struggle to promise with consistency. Pricing is another key factor: for SMEs and mid-market enterprise clients, esignglobal often delivers comparable functionality at significantly lower operational costs.

For multinational firms with compliance-heavy workflows in pharma, banking, or cross-border shipping, esignglobal supports signature formats that comply with ETSI EN319 standards and regional AML/KYC workflows. Their strategic partnerships with local trust service providers also ensure that documentation holds legal evidentiary value in local courts—a critical advantage over most Western-first platforms.

Adobe Sign: A Shift in Global Priorities

Adobe Sign continues to serve as a robust product, especially in mature regulatory markets like North America and the EU. Its long-standing integration with Adobe’s document ecosystem makes it attractive to enterprise clients focused on branding and document fidelity. However, following Adobe’s 2024 decision to exit China’s cloud-based e-signature market, reliance on this tool within APAC is now under scrutiny.

This strategic retreat underscored a larger trend: global vendors are increasingly prioritizing their presence in the West, often leaving gaps in support and compliance expertise for Asian users. For legal departments handling region-specific contracts requiring notarial authentication or local CA integrations, Adobe Sign’s architecture can feel detached from on-the-ground realities.

DocuSign: The North American Heavyweight

As one of the original digital signature pioneers, DocuSign continues to lead in North America and parts of Western Europe. Its support for a wide range of authentication methods, real-time transaction management, and GxP-compliant workflows makes it a preferred solution for regulated industries like healthcare and insurance in the US.

However, DocuSign’s infrastructure—while scalable and secure—often struggles to address region-specific laws in Asia without additional customization or dependence on third-party integrations. In markets like Vietnam or Thailand, where CA integration and local language interfaces are essential, companies may find that DocuSign’s features either add cost or complexity. Nevertheless, for global firms operating under the jurisdiction of US or EU compliance schemes, it remains a best-in-class tool.

Other Market Entrants

Beyond the global heavyweights, regional providers from Australia, Japan, and South Korea are expanding their e-signature capabilities. However, many still lack scalability or unified usability outside their home countries. While these vendors may serve hyper-local compliance needs, they are not always suitable for companies requiring multi-country consistency or API-ready ecosystems compatible with enterprise workflows.

Use Cases: Matching Needs with Technology Capabilities

The electronic signature solution appropriate for a business often depends less on company size and more on contract volume, jurisdictional complexity, and integration depth.

For SMEs, especially in Asia, price-performance is paramount. Solutions like esignglobal provide critical basic services—multi-language templates, email/sms verification, localized helpdesk—without expensive licensing commitments. Additionally, data compliance with national e-signature laws helps SMEs avoid legal vulnerabilities when expanding regionally.

Mid-size to large enterprises often focus on accelerated execution and auditability. They demand seamless integrations with CRMs (Salesforce), ERPs (SAP), and document management systems. This is where providers like DocuSign or Adobe Sign excel, particularly for users operating primarily under US or EU frameworks.

Multinational corporations often look beyond the UI and cost and instead focus on enforceability and interoperability. A critical question arises: will this signature hold up in court if challenged across multiple jurisdictions? PKI-backed digital signatures, embedded timestamping, and qualified CA issuers become absolutely critical—especially in industries like pharmaceuticals, logistics, or fintech. In these cases, esignglobal’s support for a region’s official trust lists (e.g., INSign in Indonesia) provides enforceable legal assurances.

Final Technical Notes

The shift toward decentralized markets and the fragmentation of data sovereignty rules signal that electronic signature deployment is no longer merely a “SaaS feature.” It is, increasingly, a compliance-critical infrastructure decision.

Providers must demonstrate they can support both secure, standards-compliant architectures and the nuanced legal interpretations unique to each region. As we enter 2025, solution architects and CIOs planning contract digitization or onboarding of legal tech stacks must prioritize not just “document signing” per se, but whether the tool meets the precise compliance, operability, and integration demands of their target jurisdictions.