Small to medium size companies often need to expand business to other countries, and Hong Kong often is a popular location when they expand internationally. For the expansion, it is necessary to incorporating a company in Hong Kong.
The Tips:
Business owners and entrepreneurs who wish to incorporate an offshore limited liability company in Hong Kong is definitely possible. The process to register and set up such a company is usually simple and straightforward. But entrepreneurs and business owners should take into consideration the following items.
Being a Hong Kong local resident is not a compulsory requirement. Anyone who is a non HK citizen can become be the sole director or one of the shareholders of a HK business.
The business owner who are to open a new business in Hong Kong is not required to relocate and work from HK. For as long as he wants, he can continue to run his operations from where his business headquarter is.
The entrepreneur has to physically present himself on the day when the company bank account is to open in one of the local Hong Kong banks.
The Requirements:
It is important to know the requirements.A company name is required and must be approved before the owner can proceed with the Hong Kong company registration.
A company needs to have at least one individual director, and can have up to unlimited number of directors.
The director:
- Is not required to reside in Hong Kong.
- Can be of any nationality.
- Must be a real, natural person with valid identity documents.
- Must be at least 18 years of age at the time of registration of the business.
- Must have a healthy financial status e.g. Not bankrupt.
- Can also be a shareholder of this same business.
A Hong Kong private limited company may have at least 1 shareholder, and at most 50 shareholders.
- Shareholders aren’t require to reside in Hong Kong.
- The director and shareholder can be the same person or two different persons.
- The shareholder can of any nationality but must be at least 18 years of age.
- The shareholder doesn’t have to be a natural person, andcan be a company.
- The company may be 100% local shareholding or 100% foreign shareholding.
- Using a nominee shareholder is allowed.
The appointment of a company secretary is mandatory. Should the company secretary be an individual person, he must reside in Hong Kong. If the company secretary is a body corporate, the registered office or a venue for business must be in HK. When a business hasonly one sole director/shareholder, the same person cannot act as the company secretary.
The company secretary’s main jobconsists of maintaining the statutory books and records of the company. The secretary should also make sure the company’s compliance with all statutory requirements. For a small business, often it never seems to have that much of work to occupy the full work day of a secretary. The alternative to the secretary is to appoint a nominee secretary.
The company must eventually have a registered address in Hong Kong. If the owner doesn’t have an office located in HK, it will be a problem. But he can always find a local agency who provides registered address service.