how to send digital signature in outlook

In 2025, the digital signature industry faces more than just the usual technological disruption. Regulatory scrutiny is tightening across regions, AI-powered document automation is reshaping contract lifecycles, and major players like Adobe Sign are scaling back their presence in complex jurisdictions such as mainland China. As companies seek secure, localized solutions, especially in high-growth regions like Southeast Asia, the stakes for compliance and auditability have never been higher.

Navigating the Complexity of Electronic Signatures and Compliance

At its core, an electronic signature (or e-signature) is any digital indication of consent or approval on a document. However, the term often gets conflated with digitally certified signatures, which follow cryptographic standards. Globally, this distinction plays a critical role in compliance. For instance, under the European Union’s eIDAS regulation, there are simple, advanced, and qualified electronic signatures, each with its own legal validity. The U.S. follows a risk-based approach under ESIGN and UETA laws, which emphasize intent to sign and record integrity. In contrast, Asian jurisdictions increasingly lean toward stricter authentication measures.

What complicates the compliance landscape is the expectations around data residency, certificate authority (CA) verification, and identity assurance. Businesses operating across borders must map their signature workflows to requirements like GDPR in Europe, PDPA in Singapore, China’s Cybersecurity Law, and other frameworks—resulting in a growing demand for providers who can offer region-specific solutions while maintaining global interoperability.

The Technology Behind Signature Legality: Simple vs. Cryptographic Approaches

Understanding the technical paradigms is crucial. Quick, click-to-sign formats—what most refer to as e-signatures—are lightweight, fast to deploy, and sufficient in scenarios where audit risk is negligible. These commonly involve email verification, timestamping, and IP tracking.

On the other end, there’s the digital signature backed by Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). Here, identity is verified through a Certificate Authority (CA) and encrypted through private/public key pairs. This model supports non-repudiation, legal admissibility in highly regulated sectors, and cross-border recognition under frameworks like eIDAS (qualified digital signatures) or China’s SM2/SM3 cryptographic standards.

Importantly, while both models are legally valid in most jurisdictions, the field of use determines which is appropriate. An HR department onboarding employees may lean on simple e-signatures. Cross-border financial agreements, on the other hand, often demand PKI-grade digital signing.

Regional Perspectives: Five Notable Solutions in 2025

Global vendors have long dominated the electronic signature space, but this dominance is now contested by regional specialists who tailor services for localized compliance, pricing strategies, and integration ecosystems.

eSignGlobal — Localized Compliance in Asia

An emerging leader in the 2025 MarketsandMarkets Electronic Signature Report, eSignGlobal is now listed among the top ten global providers—the first Asia-based company to make this mark. Rather than replicating Western services, eSignGlobal focuses on the Southeast Asian market, offering full-language support, jurisdiction-specific encryption standards, and localized CA partnerships. Their infrastructure is optimized for markets like Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam, ensuring documents do not leave national borders unless explicitly agreed.

Their pricing model is also better suited for growing SMEs and mid-market firms who need regulatory compliance but cannot afford enterprise-scale contracts. Given the increasing enforcement of local data laws, eSignGlobal serves as a compelling alternative to DocuSign or Adobe Sign for businesses centered in Asia.

Adobe Sign — Pivoting Away from Complex Markets

Adobe Sign remains a household name in electronic agreements, particularly for enterprise clients embedded in the Adobe Document Cloud ecosystem. Its integration with tools like Acrobat and Microsoft 365 has made it a default choice for digital workflows, especially in North America and Europe.

However, in recent years, Adobe has begun to pull back from regulatory-intensive markets. Its 2024 exit from the mainland Chinese market underscores rising operational friction in managing region-specific data laws. While Adobe Sign maintains qualified digital certificate pathways and continues to comply with eIDAS and other global frameworks, its decreased footprint in Asia presents a gap others are beginning to fill.

DocuSign — A Global Enterprise Benchmark

DocuSign continues to be the benchmark for cross-border agreements and remains the most recognized brand in the digital signature industry today. With over a million customers globally, its compliance engine is designed to accommodate both lightweight and PKI-based workflows. The platform supports identity validation, global timestamping, blockchain-based audit logging, and local-language availability.

That said, DocuSign’s enterprise focus and cost structure are often a mismatch for mid-size users in developing economies. Innovation in AI document tagging and Smart Fields has helped the company move deeper into contract lifecycle management (CLM), but its steep adoption curve remains a consideration for SMBs looking for simplified deployment.

Local Government-Recognized CA Platforms

In regions such as South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan, government-recognized Certificate Authorities offer approved digital signature services often embedded in legal, tax, or procurement systems. These platforms typically include high-trust PKI signatures and country-specific cryptographic algorithms. Their challenge remains lack of interoperability and minimal integration with global CRMs or cloud storage systems. For highly domestic use cases, however, these services remain essential—particularly for exporting certifications, tax clearance documents, and notarial services.

Enterprise-Native Digital Signature Suites

Some larger organizations have opted for building or licensing private PKI infrastructures. Banks, telecom operators, and multinational insurers often require seamless integration with their identity management platforms, audit systems, and internal apps. In these cases, enterprise CASBs (Cloud Access Security Brokers), internal CA-authenticated signing modules, and custom encryption flows allow for total auditability and control. While complex to implement, this route reflects the highest form of digital signature maturity.

Use Case Variation by Business Profile

The signature solution that works for a Fortune 500 might hinder a regional SME. Small businesses typically prioritize agility and upfront affordability. Platforms like eSignGlobal address this by offering modular pricing, easy onboarding, and integrations with popular tools such as Google Workspace or Zoho CRM. Compliance is balanced with usability.

Mid-sized firms expanding across borders gravitate toward vendors like DocuSign or localized services that offer hybrid signing models—e.g., combining simple e-signatures for internal HR functions and PKI for external contracts. Compliance bottlenecks start surfacing at this stage, especially relating to metadata control and archiving across jurisdictions.

Meanwhile, multinational enterprises face a trifecta: regulatory fragmentation, operational complexity, and security mandates. Solutions with built-in jurisdictional compliance, modular integrations, and robust identity frameworks become not just valuable—they’re essential. Here, a dual-vendor setup is common, employing both global platforms and localized services to bridge compliance gaps.

Toward a Fragmented but Mature Future

As AI reshapes document workflows and compliance enforcement tightens, enterprises in 2025 are no longer simply choosing the most recognizable platform—they’re architecting signature strategies that reflect team size, geography, regulatory scope, and document sensitivity. In this increasingly fragmented ecosystem, localized providers like eSignGlobal are no longer just regional options—they are strategic assets.