Our lawyers specialize in assisting international clients that make business investments in Hong Kong, China, Japan, Thailand and throughout Asia and as a starting point of our working relationship we commonly advise on and establish corporate structures for our clients prior to assisting with a range of other services.
We have helped clients incorporate a variety of operational business entities throughout most of Asia in countries such as, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Philippines. We also often advise our clients to establish entities in Hong Kong, Singapore, British Virgin Islands, Caymans Islands or another “offshore” country as the shareholder of the business entity they establish in one of Asia’s manufacturing or consumerism profit-making centers.
Due to transparent laws, advanced banking systems and favorable tax rates the majority of our clients decide to establish holding companies in Hong Kong or Singapore.
A major benefit of controlling Asia-based operational subsidiaries from these countries is that these entities can efficiently bring in (or remove if necessary) shareholders as investors and business partners. Adding and removing shareholders from countries such as China is more difficult and time consuming. In addition, if the subsidiary of a holding company experiences success in one country, such as China, and then moves on to establish multiple operating entities in China and/or in other Asian countries, the holding company often becomes a valuable asset which may attract new investors and potentially be sold or listed on a stock market.
Establishing an entity in China, Japan or Southeast Asia involves multiple procedures and the physical filing of notarized and executed local language documents with various government departments and such procedures can become complex and time-consuming. We specialize in establishing foreign invested entities such as wholly foreign owned enterprises (WFOE), joint ventures, general and limited partnerships and limited liability companies in China, Japan and Southeast Asia and also assist with applications for particular licenses when required. In addition, we also provide physical or virtual addresses that are required during company establishment upon the request of our clients. Having one firm assist with establishing holding companies in tax efficient jurisdictions and also establishing operational subsidiaries in Asia’s major markets streamlines this process, so instead of spending time to meet with multiple firms regarding corporate structure, our clients can begin to focus on securing business deals shortly after meeting with our professionals.
International businesses that establish Asia-based companies have a number of options open to them in terms of corporate structure. The optimal choice is primarily a function of which activities the company plans to undertake in Asia. It is relatively straight forward to incorporate a company but it is crucial to get proper advice on how to structure the ownership of that company. Every case is different and expertise is often required to ensure that a chosen corporate structure will help a business achieve its goals.
Once we have understood our client’s business goals, our experts recommend tax-efficient corporate structure and we assist our clients with company establishment in the following countries:
- Offshore: Hong Kong, Singapore, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Guernsey, Seychelles and other tax efficient jurisdictions
- Asia: China, Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia
- Special Economic Zones: Shanghai Free-Trade Zone, Guangdong Free-Trade Zone, Thai-Chinese Rayong Industrial Zone, Bangkok Free-Trade Zone
Company Maintenance and Management
Our objective is to provide efficient and cost-effective services tailored to the specific needs of our clients. We offer company maintenance services, from providing a registered address, to appointing local nominee directors, to providing external accounting and human resources teams, throughout Asia.
After an operating company has been established, the business will have tax filing and other regulatory requirements to fulfil and when a company is incorporated in an offshore or Asian jurisdiction (where employees are not necessarily required) and the business will have to maintain a minimum presence in its jurisdiction of incorporation in some cases.
To assist clients operating Asia-based businesses from overseas, our accounting, tax and human resources professionals provide outsourced services to enable our clients to focus on their core business functions without having to spend extensive amounts of time on the administrative aspects of running their businesses.
For example, after the establishment of a foreign invested enterprise in China, many ongoing procedures need to be fulfilled in order to make and keep a business fully operational. When our clients are expanding their businesses into China they often prefer to outsource administrative tasks such as accounting and tax compliance over hiring their own employees to complete these tasks. Our accounting and tax experts in China provide these services to help simplify the initial years of business operations for our clients and set them off on the right path with regards to managing their businesses in an unfamiliar market. Afterwards, some clients continue to outsource accounting and tax work to with our professionals while others hire internal staff to complete this work.
Many of our clients establish businesses in offshore jurisdictions such as Hong Kong, Singapore and BVI but they do not normally visit these countries and would prefer to outsource statutory accounting and compliance obligations to an external firm. For instance, the Hong Kong Companies Ordinance requires a limited company to appoint a Company Secretary. The function of Company Secretary is to be in charge of arranging meetings, keeping minutes of meetings and presenting statutory documents to governmental departments in order to ensure that a company meets statutory requirements. Moxiu has our own team of Company Secretaries and accountants that can be appointed to complete ongoing compliance obligations on the behalf of our clients in Hong Kong, enabling our clients to avoid visits to Hong Kong when they are too busy to complete these routine accounting and compliance matters.