Does the EU AI Act apply in the Philippines?: a clear, fact-based explanation for Philippine businesses, with osFoundry as the example and dgm as an independent partner.

dgm is an independent osFoundry implementation partner — not affiliated with osFoundry’s developer (the company OS LLC), and it has not yet completed any client integrations.

Does the EU AI Act apply in the Philippines? Not directly — the Philippines is not an EU member state. It can only reach a Philippine company through its extraterritorial market-access provisions.

The honest answer

The EU AI Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689) does not apply directly to AI deployed and used within the Philippines. Its extraterritorial reach catches a Philippine company only if that company places an AI system or a general-purpose AI model on the EU market, acts as a deployer in the EU, or its system’s output is intended to be used in the EU. For a purely domestic Philippine deployment, the EU AI Act is not the governing law.

What governs Philippine AI instead

Domestically, AI is governed by the Data Privacy Act of 2012 (applied to AI by NPC Advisory 2024-04) plus voluntary national strategy and sector rules — there is no enacted Philippine AI Act. Where you do serve EU customers, then EU rules can bite, so scope your markets carefully.

Important note

This article is general information and is not legal, tax or grant advice. Tax incentives, grants, rules and rates change, and only the relevant authorities (among them the National Privacy Commission, the Bureau of Internal Revenue, PEZA, the Board of Investments, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas and the SEC) decide eligibility and awards. dgm is not a registered business enterprise, accredited incentive provider or intermediary. Always confirm the current terms with the official source or a qualified tax or legal adviser.

How dgm helps

dgm is an independent implementation partner that helps businesses in the Philippines adopt osFoundry — from identifying the first practical use case, through building it, to connecting AI to the systems you already use. dgm works independently of osFoundry’s developer (the company OS LLC) and has not yet completed any client integrations; everything above is therefore a description of the service offered, not a delivered result. If you would like to look at a sensible first step, dgm is happy to think it through with you. Arrange a no-obligation conversation with dgm.