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Countries ranked by ease of starting a business
- utunga 16y agommm NZ seems very high in the rankings but the vc/angel investment community very immature over here... possible opportunity for low hanging fruit just across the ditch for a few valley based investors perhaps ? ;-)
- barrydahlberg 16y agoThere sure is. The legal process of getting a company going here in NZ is really very simple. The distance from the rest of the world feels kind of overwhelming at times which is our big disadvantage. No over land connections with other countries, not in the middle of a nice trade route or anything. Great time to be a techy here though, the internet is a wonderful thing, when it works. I saw a big of talk about VC work in agriculture and so on, not so much in the web space.
- steveh73 16y agoNZ has expensive (and not particularly fast) internet, which is probably why. On the other hand, setting up a limited-liability company took me an hour (including registering for GST) and cost $40 when I did it (it's a little more now), and costs nothing to renew. And the time zone difference means we're often working when the US is sleeping, which can be handy when you're deploying a new version of a production site for a US audience.
- nigelsampson 16y agoI set up my LLC around a month ago, very painless and cost me $160. I think the distance thing is a factor, however for internet based start ups it's not as important.
- vosper 16y agoDeploying updates to production sites when the US is sleeping is a massive boon, it was one of the reasons my previous employer did all their R&D in New Zealand. The downside is that pagers tended to go off in the middle of our night when server load was highest. The company has been extremely successful, but the software is complex and recruiting and retaining skilled employees here has become an issue for them. I think they've been forced to move some R&D over to the US as a result.
- quizbiz 16y agoI'm surprised Israel was so low given the info I read in the book Startup Nation (http://www.startupnationbook.com/ http://www.startupnationbook.com/)
- Murkin 16y agoAs noted in other comments, the numbers are a bit skewed. E.g. it takes half a morning to open a company. But it takes up to two weeks to get all the approval documents mailed to you. In any case, this info is not for tech-startups, its statistics for opening 'real' businesses.
- ronnier 16y agoIsrael ranks really low on "Dealing with Construction Permits" and "Registering Property", according to this list. Don't let this list fool you, it's a true start up nation. The amount of tech and start-ups coming from Israel is amazing. From the book: "a country of 7.1 million, only 60 years old, surrounded by enemies, in a constant state of war since its founding, with no natural resources— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? How is it that Israel has, per person, attracted over twice as much venture capital investment as the US and thirty times more than Europe?"
- dejb 16y agoI suspect that not having the correct ethnicity or religious beliefs would be an obstacle for some though.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- hga 16y agoI haven't read the book but are the scores really that low? These are rankings compared to other nations, the scale is not linear. It's easier to startup a business in Iceland and more difficult in Norway, the two counties on either side of Israel.
- 16y ago
- paolomaffei 16y agoYes, Italy did it! Last in Western Europe and highly developed countries (a part from Greece).
- RK 16y agoI don't understand how Greece is rated 76 in "paying taxes". My understanding is that Greeks simply don't pay taxes... </sarcasm>
- dboyd 16y agoMy experience in Canada in starting a business agrees with its 2nd place rank. It only took a couple of hours to get an incorporated business setup, as long as it's a numbered company (e.g., 4312341 Alberta Inc., although, I forget what my number was). It's a couple more hours to open a bank account, make a shareholder loan, and get company cheques (sic). All in all, it takes about a morning to have a legal operating funded company up and running. Of course, revenue is another story :).
- ursablanco 16y agoI agree, in Canada it seems trivial. Perhaps the study presumes some lower level of capacity, literacy or computer ability. The numbers for 'enforceability of contracts' and 'paying taxes' are absurd. Puts the rest of the results in doubt.
- derre1 16y agoI'm not sure all those numbers are correct. I was born in the Dominican Republic and I can say that the time to open a business is least than 20 days. Besides, there are some companies offering "packaged business"s with legal fees, registrations, and other paperwork ready. You can buy one of those and get up and running in 24 hours. They take care of transfering the company to you.
- hga 16y agoWhat's the cost, especially compared to standard incomes in the nation? I know a number of countries score very poorly because of this (CHANGED: per capita income is a factor in the calculation: http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusiness.aspx http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusi...).
- barrydahlberg 16y agoMy wife is Japanese and when I said I was starting a company she asked me But, how? Are you even allowed to do that? I didn't really understand how you could not be at the time. I guess that's why NZ ranks #1 and Japan ranks #91 for getting started.
- patio11 16y agoOne of the big things we did at the tech incubator is tell people how easy it is to start a company -- there isn't a significantly higher paperwork burden or capital requirement these days than there is for a US LLC. (That did not used to be true.) The problem is that this has not hit the mainstream in terms of cultural acceptance yet. I knew this and I was absolutely amazed by the amount of time it took to get my health insurance, pension, and taxes squared away when I went full-time: 3 hours. Two hours of that was bike riding to and from city hall.
- basugasubaku 16y agoHow does one get a visa to be in Japan if they intend to start a company there? It would appear to be difficult to get a visa if you are not already profitable, correct?
- patio11 16y agoTalk to me privately for specifics. Short version: getting a visa is hard, renewing one is easy if you are as profitable as your previous employment. The easy paths go through native megacorps.
- Swoopey 16y agoIndeed. Starting a business in Japan is a hurry-up and wait game. There was a recent panel sponsored by the ACCJ last month which invited several government officials to a panel discussion to inquire into why things were so burdensome and to come up with solutions. At the conclusion of the panel we had a long list of ways the 'start-up' process and culture of Japan could be improved-- among them was updating laws, making banking and related matters for small business (bank transfer fees) easier, encouraging the media to cover more entrepreneurs, and engaging college students in the start-up process more. I'm a start-up founder based in Tokyo and the most popular questions I receive is, why are you founding a start-up focused on a market outside of Japan? Market research aside and my being American who will be returning to the US some time in the very near future, Japan is not the easiest company to start and run and successful small operation in. A Rank of #91 for such an advanced country is an indication of the system being broken and burdensome.
- rikthevik 16y agoI think there's probably a direct correlation to economic strength and development here as well.
- frisco 16y agoReading this list made me think, "wow, I could have been born in so many other countries, with such dramatically different possibilities, but I was born in the US." Just a strange thought to consider. A lot of these countries barely have the rule of law: police misbehavior anywhere is unacceptable, but next time I see "Police mistreat innocent bystander X" here or on reddit, I'll think "but at least you can't walk down the street and bribe the cop to get away with Z" for a second before I start being furious with the system.
- auxbuss 16y agoWell, that put numbers around my recent decision to return from Spain to the UK. I love Spain to bits, but doing business there, legally, is utterly impossible even when fluent in the language. It's very easy to do business there illegally and cheap, if that's your thing.
- lemming 16y agoIt's not impossible, but it is a gigantic pain in the ass. We contracted a law
- lemming 16y agoI'm not sure why I can't seem to edit my previous comment, or what happened to it. We contracted a law firm specialising in foreigners running companies here in Spain. They're really good, but the amount of running around I have to do is still huge and some things really are impossible (e.g. getting a foreign contract talking about monetary amounts notarised). I would certainly never incorporate here by choice.
- biznickman 16y agoMaybe rather than push the startup visa act we should push the: create a company in 5 minutes act and the pay less taxes on your company act :)
- lionhearted 16y agoNot sure how accurate this list is. Thailand, for instance, requires all businesses to have at least 51% Thai ownership, and I've heard Thai courts are fairly heavily biased towards locals over foreigners. Foreigners can skirt around this a little bit by having 10+ Thai silent partners in different parts of the country that don't know each other who collect a dividend or payment each year without active involvement, but still a hassle and reflective of the lack of trust Thailand has for foreign investors and entrepreneurs. Also, I was surprised by some of the rankings. I'd have expected UAE and Israel to be higher than Germany and the Scandinavian countries for instance, but maybe I'm biased by experiences with small sample size. I've had German friends complain to no end about the Kafka-esque bureaucracy of the country, and generally I've had Israelis and expats in the Emirates tell me doing business is easy in those places.
- hga 16y agoTheir methodology assume the company "Is 100% domestically owned" (http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusiness.aspx http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusi...).
- lionhearted 16y agoAh, that changes things quite a lot. Good info, thanks for pointing that out. Unfortunately, this makes the list less pragmatically useful for choosing places to live abroad... I wonder if there's any reliable info like this for how well treated you are as a foreigner doing business in a country.
- mjnaus 16y agoYou're wrong here. For certain businesses, foreign ownership can be the full 100%. When we opened our business here, we actually had the change to go this route, but choose not to because it would have been more hassle though. But I am also wondering how accurate this list is. And what qualifies as a "business"? Here in Thailand, many small businesses don't requite any form of legal entity and opening a small shop for example would be as easy as renting some space, putting in inventory and open your doors.... doens't get much easier then that. Imagine trying that in the US or UK... The ease of opening a small business here in Thailand beats any country that comes before Thailand on that list...
- apotheon 16y agoStarting a business in the United States is a little like pulling your own teeth while getting your fingernails trimmed with a wood chipper. The fact that it still ranks fourth overall just indicates how much worse most of the rest of the world is. It's amazing to me that so many nations (the US included) seem to want it to be so difficult for people to succeed in business.
- whakojacko 16y agoto be honest, it ranks 8th in actually starting a business. The 4th ranking is the overall doing business ranking, which takes other factors into account.
- apotheon 16y agoGood point. Thanks for pointing that out. Still . . . that's within 5% of the top of the list, which is shocking given the obstacles to entrepreneurship in the US.
- jsolson 16y agoI set up a Georgia LLC in the course of an afternoon. State registration, federal EIN, bank account. Income for the LLC is treated as personal income for me (it's a single member LLC that's disregarded by the IRS), so even taxes aren't that complicated. Perhaps I'm doing something very wrong or very illegal, but nothing I've read seems to suggest that. What did you find to be so much more painful?
- apotheon 16y agoIn my area, it takes no fewer than three different licenses just to set up a consultancy that doesn't even sell products (pure service oriented business) -- and that doesn't address any of the issues aside from licensure (tax ID, ensuring your business name is not a trademark infringement, et cetera). The worst thing about it, though, is not the complexity of it. The worst thing about it is that, because one has to check everything at local, state, and federal levels, and because each of these levels is often very poorly organized where the "end user" is concerned, it took me an afternoon just to find out about all that stuff. In fact, some of it I stumbled across by accident while looking for something else, and was surprised to find it. I'm pretty much positive that I missed some things before I gave up. It requires a lawyer to be even reasonably sure (as opposed to completely sure) you aren't doing something illegal. If I have to choose between paying for a lawyer I can ill afford and wondering for the first three years of starting the business whether I'm going to end up in court for doing it wrong, the process of setting up a business is not easy enough. edit: There is a difference between "setting up" a business on paper (so you can claim to have one) and being able to start actually conducting business without running the risk of pissing off government.
- nihilocrat 16y agoI'm curious if anyone has worked for a company in Singapore, done lots of business with one, or better yet started one. By these rankings and the stereotypes I've learned it basically seems like a capitalist's paradise, with practically the whole society being pro-business and a gigantic minority of the population (42% according to Wikipedia) being foreign workers/students.
- abi 16y agoExcept there's no startup ecosystem and the culture is very traditional.
- donaq 16y agoWhat do you mean by "ecosystem"? I'm Singaporean and AFAIK there's a shitload of people doing startups here, though of course not as much as in Silicon Valley. You're probably right, though, about the culture being traditional if you're referring to funding. Please note, though, that these are just opinions based on personal experience.
- albahk 16y agoCheck out this blog by a couple of HN'ers doing a startup in Singapore: http://nakedstartup.com/2010/04/singapore-is-nice-but-its-not-enough/ http://nakedstartup.com/2010/04/singapore-is-nice-but-its-no... The Startup: http://www.gameplanapp.com http://www.gameplanapp.com I have no affiliation with them, just been reading their blog
- metamemetics 16y agoMy impression was it used to be a haven for large business. But due to rising costs they are moving nearby to Malaysia and Indonesia and just keeping management offices in Singapore (ex. memc.com). I haven't heard of it attracting young international people looking to do startups primarily because it's not a very liberal society. Chewing gum is illegal and cannabis possession carries a penalty of execution. A sharp contrast to Silicon Valley\California.
- 16y ago
- acangiano 16y agoRanking for the G8 nations: 4 - United States 5 - United Kingdom 8 - Canada 15 - Japan 25 - Germany 31 - France 78 - Italy 120 - Russia With the exception of Russia, which has its roots in communism, Italy is by far the worst G8 country you could start a business in.
- rospaya 16y agoThis (again) makes me wonder what Italy is doing in G8. Let's give China or Spain a shot.
- mahmud 16y agoSpain? The "S" in PIIGS? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIGS_%28economics%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIGS_%28economics%29
- jbarciauskas 16y agoI say this not out of any great personal insight but because it was featured on NPR recently: Let's give China or <strike>Spain</strike>Brazil a shot NPR story: http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake-money-saved-brazil http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake...
- apotheon 16y agoItaly and Germany have their (recent) roots in fascism. France has its in . . . well. I'm not going to go there. Note that the UK produced Adam Smith and, to a nontrivial degree, the US, and Canada. The culture and early government of the US in particular was notably influenced by the ideas of Adam Smith as well. What Smith called "economic individualism" is pretty much the foundation of a strong economy, and to the extent that we stray from that two things happen: 1. individuals find it more difficult to start and run small businesses 2. the economy suffers I am not surprised at all at the relative rankings of these G8 nations.
- kloncks 16y agoInteresting that the countries with the most startups (USA, Israel, some in Europe, etc) aren't that highly ranked compared to surprises like Saudi Arabia. I really didn't expect Israel to be so low and Saudi Arabia so high. Anyone know why?
- metamemetics 16y agoWhile the majority of Saudi's economy is not private sector, they have recently been trying to rapidly grow it with pro-business incentives. Basically the government realized oil is 55% of their GDP and needed to diversify their portfolio.
- zalew 16y agoDoes it not only concern natives? Doing business as a native in countries of the Gulf is far more different than doing it as a foreigner (see how to set up a business in Dubai, UAE). UAE is also high in the ranks, still for me, as I researched, starting up there seemed more complicated and expensive than here in Poland (low in the ranks), except taxes (a PITA around here).
- rglovejoy 16y agoWhat is the spread? For instance, the US comes in fourth and the UK fifth. How much of a difference is there between being #4 and #5?
- jemmj 16y agoI don't trust this list at all. I have just formed a company in Ireland and Portugal. Ireland is ranked 7 and Portugal ranked 48. In reality Portugal was about 3 times faster than Ireland, but cost about double.
- hga 16y agoCost is part of the methodology and they factor in per capita income, both of which adversely affect Portugal: http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusiness.aspx http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusi...
- borism 16y agoanyone planning/doing a start-up in Mauritius?
- maheshs 16y agoI am not complaining, but not sure how they are calculating it. Ease of starting a business also depend upon the business type in every country.
- reitzensteinm 16y agoStarting a company in New Zealand was pleasantly surprising. First you sign up for an account at http://companies.govt.nz http://companies.govt.nz, then you use the web app (which worked fine with Opera) to fill in the details about your new company. Consent forms are emailed to you, which you fill out, scan in and upload. A few hours later, after being reviewed by a human, your company is formed and your certificate of incoproration is emailed to you. In fact the only trouble I had at all was that PayPal wouldn't let me sign up with a business that had been started that day - I had to wait until the day after to start taking payments. One of the few government interactions I've ever had that left me in a better mood afterwards.
- sandGorgon 16y agoJust wanted to mention the process of registering a company in India has mostly moved online using the Ministry of Company Affairs website (http://www.mca.gov.in/ http://www.mca.gov.in/). The most time consuming thing is acquiring a Digital Certificate (which is how most financial filings are done in India these days), which involves in-person verification. India recently introduced Limited Liability Partnerships (http://www.llp.gov.in/ http://www.llp.gov.in/) which is a much, much simpler way of registering a company, especially in the software field, than anything else (most of it online)
- manish 16y agoI was really sad to see India ranked so low. I remember my friend starting a company by paying Rs 6000 to broker, who took care of all the things. Things work differently in India, if you do not go through a broker, you might take a few weeks :-(
- known 16y agoe-Governance == e-Red Tape (in India)
- jlees 16y agoReally surprised that the UK ranks 16th on 'Starting a Business' and the US ranks 8th. From what I know, it takes a lot longer, costs more, and tends to involve actual lawyers to open a business in the US. In the UK, I did it all online for £25.
- davidw 16y agoMaybe you're comparing apples to oranges? It's pretty easy/cheap to set up a LLC in most US states on line.
- points 16y agoIt's because they list out "Contact HMRC and register for PAYE" as taking 8 days, and they seem to think you can't actually trade before that's done. Which is idiotic. So the study is pretty inaccurate.
- InclinedPlane 16y agoWhere do you "know" this from? Starting a business is dead simple in the US. Create a Delaware class-C corporation, or one in the state you live in if you prefer (in my case, in the state of Washington, it was just a few online forms and a nominal fee).
- jlees 16y agoBelated reply, my knowledge for the US side is from threads on HN, which have greatly exaggerated the process if it's true that you can do it all online in a few minutes.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- nradov 16y agoThis is a ranking of ease of doing business, not starting a business. If you want to start a business in the USA as a sole proprietorship then you can just go ahead and start it.
- loewenskind 16y agoAs with most countries.
- chaosmachine 16y agoLook at the second column, "Starting a Business". http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/?direction=Asc&sort=2 http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/?direction=Asc&...
- points 16y agoThis is very inaccurate. For example, starting a business in the UK takes an hour or so (Fill out a form online). But it's listed here as taking 13 days, and thus UK is ranked 16th for starting a business.
- mmaunder 16y agoThe rankings seem almost arbitrary. South Africa is 2 for getting credit. I'm South African and there's just now way that's true. Banking in SA is extremely expensive and there's no such thing as a free checking account. Most of the population has no credit history and those who do use credit sparingly and find it hard to get. US is 8 and UK 16 for starting a business. What does that mean? It's hard/easy to incorporate? It's incredibly easy to create a Limited company in the UK or LLC, S or C corp in the USA. (I've inc'd in both countries). What does the number 1 country have that US or UK doesn't have? Paying taxes in the USA is 61 vs South Africa's 23? No way. Paying your taxes in South Africa is a serious pain in the behind - I continue to do it. We file our USA C corp and personal corp taxes ourselves each year and it's a breeze in the States. My guess is this is based on public opinion with a relatively small sample size per country.
- nbf 16y ago>Most of the population has no credit history and those who do use credit sparingly and find it hard to get I don't agree with you here. The entire furniture retail industry is based on selling goods on credit to poor people. The National Credit Act tightened lending up, and reduced some of the more blatant exploitation, but it is very easy to get credit, if you want it. >Paying taxes in the USA is 61 vs South Africa's 23? No way. Paying your taxes in South Africa is a serious pain in the behind - I continue to do it. We file our USA C corp and personal corp taxes ourselves each year and it's a breeze in the States. I am surprised that you consider tax in South Africa to be more complex than the US. Could you elaborate?
- MarkMc 16y agoInteresting that 8 out of the top 10 countries are former British colonies (or Britain itself).
- nbf 16y agoSouth Africa's ranking is likely to fall in the next survey. There have been recently been well publicised cases where company directors have been fraudulently replaced at CIPRO, the government agency that handles these registrations, due to a lack of adequate controls. The directors are replaced and the bank accounts are emptied (the new "directors" get signing powers at the bank) before anyone realises what's happened. The Deeds Office (land registry) has also has had fraudlent land transfers going through, and although stealing land is more difficult that hijacking a company, it has happened, with complicity between crooked lawyers and corrupt officials. In most cases these hijackings, of land, and of companies, have been reversed by courts, but the time and expense of going to court could cripple a small business. If you start a business in South Africa, and decide to incorporate, you should make sure you verify directors regularly, watch your business bank accounts closely, and hope that the government sorts out the mess (there are new controls that are being introduced already at CIPRO).
- smcl 16y agoInteresting to see Chile so far down the list (well, 49th) given how keen they have been to attract startups recently.
- agconway 16y agoNote: there is literally no relationship between a country's 'Starting a Business' rank and their 'Closing a Business.' http://plixi.com/p/50051085 http://plixi.com/p/50051085 This seems odd to me, but wonder if anyone has an explanation as to why this might be?
- frederikfleck 16y agoShocking results for Germany. Know where that is coming from... But once you have done a bit there it is quiet straight forward. So let me know if I can help anybody doing business or starting a company in Germany.