Manu is joining the law faculty as a PhD candidate at ACELG and ACT. He has a very interdisciplinary background with a bachelor’s in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (with a minor in law) and master’s in Law and Economics, both at Utrecht University. After graduating from his master’s, he worked briefly on a project for the Dutch media authority (CvdM) on the impact of platforms as a new form of corporate power on the media landscape.

His research interests lie in new forms of corporate power and the effects on markets and society. For his PhD project, the aim is to combine approaches from EU Company Law and EU Competition Law to better capture emerging forms of corporate power, and to develop a framework to regulate and counter the effects of this power.

Sofia is beginning her joint PhD with ACELG and IVIR. She will be researching European law on sustainable digital infrastructure, with a particular focus on the environmental impact of AI data centers and how it can be regulated under EU law.

Previously, she worked at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam within educational innovation, sustainability, and AI at the VU Centre for Teaching and Learning, and at the VU Student Administration department. She holds an LL.M. in International Business Law: Climate Change & Corporations, and a second LL.M. in International Technology Law. Before that, she graduated from an LL.B. in Law in Society (cum laude, Valedictorian, Best Thesis Award).