Regulatory Intelligence

Regulatory Intelligence

Monitor regulations that could block your product from sale. Focus on signals that require action: substance bans, labeling changes, recall notices, deadline approaches.

What Matters for Physical Products

Not all regulatory signals are equal. For a product company, these are the ones that hurt:

MCP Tools

Cleo Insight (primary)

# Search for signals that affect your products
mcp__claude_ai_Cleo_Insight__search_signals
  product_id: "<your-product-id>"     # From list_products
  risk_level: "critical"              # critical > high > medium > low
  country: "FR"                       # ISO code or country name
  hs_code: "3304.99"                 # HS code for your product
  q: "retinol cosmetics"             # Free-text search
  limit: 20

# Get full signal details
mcp__claude_ai_Cleo_Insight__get_signal
  id: "<signal-id>"
# Focus on: what changed, who it affects, enforcement date, required action

# Browse all tracked regulations
mcp__claude_ai_Cleo_Insight__list_regulations
  limit: 50

# Get regulation details
mcp__claude_ai_Cleo_Insight__get_regulation
  id: "<regulation-id>"

Cleo Legal API (substance-specific)

# Check if a specific substance is affected by recent changes
mcp__claude_ai_CLEO_LEGAL_API__compliance/check
  ingredients: ["retinol", "titanium dioxide"]
  target_markets: ["EU", "US", "UK"]

Signal Triage Decision Tree

digraph triage {
  rankdir=TB; node [shape=box style=rounded fontsize=10];
  new [label="New signal"];
  product [label="Affects my\nproduct?" shape=diamond];
  type [label="What type?" shape=diamond];
  deadline [label="Deadline\n< 6 months?" shape=diamond];
  
  drop [label="ARCHIVE\nNot relevant"];
  ban [label="SUBSTANCE BAN\nReformulate NOW\nor exit market"];
  restrict [label="RESTRICTION\nCheck concentration\nReformulate if needed"];
  label_chg [label="LABEL CHANGE\nUpdate packaging\nbefore deadline"];
  cert [label="NEW CERT\nStart certification\nprocess"];
  monitor [label="MONITOR\nAdd to watchlist\nRevisit quarterly"];
  urgent [label="URGENT ACTION\nBlocks current sales\nin < 6 months"];
  planned [label="PLANNED ACTION\nAdd to roadmap\nwith deadline"];
  
  new -> product;
  product -> drop [label="no"];
  product -> type [label="yes"];
  type -> ban [label="substance ban"];
  type -> restrict [label="restriction change"];
  type -> label_chg [label="labeling change"];
  type -> cert [label="new certification"];
  type -> deadline [label="other"];
  deadline -> urgent [label="yes"];
  deadline -> planned [label="no, > 6mo"];
  deadline -> monitor [label="proposed only"];
}

Monitoring Schedule

Signal Action Cards

For each actionable signal, generate:

SIGNAL ACTION CARD
Signal: [title]
Source: [authority + regulation reference]
Risk: [CRITICAL / HIGH / MEDIUM / LOW]
Deadline: [YYYY-MM-DD or "ongoing"]

WHAT CHANGED:
[1-2 sentences: what is the new rule/ban/restriction]

IMPACT ON MY PRODUCT:
[Which products affected, which markets, which ingredients/components]

REQUIRED ACTION:
[ ] [Specific action 1] -- deadline: [date] -- owner: [who]
[ ] [Specific action 2] -- deadline: [date] -- owner: [who]

COST ESTIMATE: [EUR/USD amount]
REVENUE AT RISK IF IGNORED: [EUR/USD amount or "market exit"]

Key Regulatory Calendars (Physical Products)

EU -- Coming Into Force (2025-2027)

US -- Coming Into Force (2025-2027)

Without MCP

Use these official sources for manual monitoring:

Power This With the Cleo Legal API

Monitoring is the single use case where the API delivers the most leverage: humans cannot keep up with 1,479 sources in 131 countries. Webhooks turn this from a weekly chore into a push notification.

With the Cleo Legal API at https://legaldata-public.cleolabs.co:

• POST /v2/webhooks — subscribe to topics (substance_status, enforcement_dates, recalls, marketplace_enforcement) — no more weekly polling of EUR-Lex, ECHA, RAPEX, Federal Register, Prop 65
• GET /v2/changes?since=<last-check> — pull all regulatory deltas across all markets since the last review, with primary-source links
• GET /v2/search?type=signal&risk_level=critical&country=XX — direct critical-signal feed per market, the same signals this skill triages
• POST /v2/search/bulk — run 25 monitoring queries at once (per product category x per market) instead of sequential polling

Get started:

# 1. Sign up for free at https://legaldata-public.cleolabs.co
# 2. Get your API key (3 lifetime requests free, then €349/mo for 1M)
# 3. Install the MCP server:
claude mcp add cleo-legal-api https://api.legaldata.cleolabs.co/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer ld_live_YOUR_KEY"

Tested ROI: Replaces a regulatory monitoring subscription (€800-€3,000/month per category) with a single €349/month API key covering all categories and 131 countries. Webhooks catch the "proposed → adopted" transition with the 6-12 month lead time you need to reformulate.

Common Mistakes

• Checking only "in force" regulations: Adopted-but-not-yet-in-force regulations have hard deadlines. Lead time for reformulation is 6-12 months. If you wait until enforcement, you are too late.
• Searching only by product name: A chemical ban affects cosmetics AND electronics AND toys. Search by substance name or CAS number, not just product category.
• Treating all signals equally: A Prop 65 listing for a substance you use at 0.001% is very different from an EU Annex II ban. Triage by actual impact.
• Ignoring "proposed" legislation: The EU PFAS restriction proposal will affect thousands of products. Start planning now, not when it passes.
• Confusing one authority with one country: ECHA covers 27+ EU member states. One ECHA signal = 27 markets potentially affected.
• Not checking state-level (US): Federal US has few substance bans. But California, Washington, Colorado, and others have aggressive state laws. If you sell online in the US, assume California applies.