Running a business in Hong Kong has endless benefits for a new company to take advantage of. Hence why it’s such a popular location for new business. A massive number of start-up business owners, quite understandably. Can see the potential of following those that have gone before them, and reaping the rewards, and who can blame them? One of the best and most enticing reasons to set up shop in Hong Kong is that the overseeing governing body of business. Admin has a goal of trying to ensure that all businesses do well. However, you are going to need some help with registration, for the following reasons.
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What’s involved?
To set up a business is reasonably easy, according to experts, however, that’s easy for them to say, after all, it’s what they do. The biggest challenge is the number of decisions that you must make. And to know the process inside out to ensure that you miss anything, and the process has quite a few steps to go through. You’re going to want to make sure that you are well prepare before you even consider registration. As such, you’ll need to investigate pre-registration information to get you started
Pre-registration information
First, you’re going to want to decide upon your business structure, which lays the foundation for your company registration. This will entail you knowing the various business categories and knowing where your company will sit based upon its purpose. Depending upon your situation, you may have the choice of the following categories to choose from or fit into.
- A Sole proprietorship
- A Branch office
- A Company limited by guarantee
- A Company limited by shares
- Partnerships
This is where you really need to do your homework to ensure that you don’t have any hiccups along the way. It’s particularly important because, if you choose the wrong category, only to find out later down the line you may have to start over.
What will your company be known as?
If you haven’t done so already. Then by this stage you’re going to need to get your thinking cap on to choose a company name. It might sound an easy task, however anybody that undergoes the task before will likely say otherwise. You’ll have to risk assess the name to make sure that it’s unique. Your company name also needs to be something that sticks, something people will remember easily. And you have the option of having the name in both Chinese and English or sticking with one or the other.
Appoint and name the responsible people
As you’d expect, you’re going to need to appoint, and name the people who will be running your business. This is the stage at which you can choose your officers, and shares. Following their appointment, you’ll then need to do the same with the directors, which can be as many as you want. If needed, every business will need at least one director though, so it could just be you.
Next on the list is to decide upon shareholders. This stage will require some further thought, and research so that you make the right choices for the future of your business. You’ll then need to appoint a company secretary, which cannot be you, if you are the sole director. Once that is done, that should be the end of appointing the officials of your business.
Choosing, and registering your address
You are going to need to have an address to register your business. Unfortunately, you can’t have a ‘virtual office’, or a P.O box as a mailing address. You may want to investigate this in some more depth prior to doing everything else. Because it will likely take up a large amount of your time and effort. If you aren’t based in Hong Kong, then the chances are that you’ll want to go and see what’s on offer for yourself. To speak with the relevant parties involved for either the purchase, or rental of a suitable premises.
Be sure to do your homework
Leaving your enquiries until this stage could well set you back some time, and money. Which will only serve as a rather large inconvenience to you, and to whoever is helping you to set up your business. With that said, the last thing you need now is a bottleneck because. If all the above is taken care of, then you are ready to decide on the share capital, and to finally go through the registration process!
Get help?
After reading all of that, and doing your homework. You’ll now need to make the easy choice of whether you’re going to tackle this alone, or employ experts in Hong Kong to do it for you.
