Establishing a Legal Presence in Georgia

There are no restrictions on the foreign ownership of companies in Georgia.

As a result of changes to the Tax Code and Law on Entrepreneurs in 2005 and 2006, business registration is simple, cheap and efficient, taking only three days for legal entities and one day for individuals. Unified state and tax registration of companies is now carried out by tax inspectorates under one single procedure.

• The state and tax registration of the enterprise is performed in accordance with the application and documents regarding the organization of the corresponding organizational-legal form.  
• The application for registration is submitted to the authorizing tax body in accordance with the location of the organization. The application for each type of organization should include: 
  1.        Firm name (Firm);
  2.        Organizational-legal form;
  3.        Location (Legal address);
  4.        Full names, residential address, nationality, ID/document number and ID/ number of all constituents, but if the constituent is a legal entity the following are required : firm name and information on registration (legal address, name of the registration body, date and code of registration, identification code, organizational-legal form, information on representatives);
  5.        Representation authorization;
  A special partnership company, besides the above information, is required to mention the amount of the fee and the certificate confirming the payment of the fee. 
  In addition, for a limited liability company, joint stock company, and cooperative the following are required:

• Attached to the application are the following documents:

• The individuals that are responsible for representing the organization should submit the certified signatures that they will use in further business relations.
• Authorized signature of director/manager that should be submitted for state and tax registration, also all attached documents or their copies should be notarized (notarial verification).

• The authorizing tax body is obliged to perform the state and tax registration of the enterprise within 3 days from the date of submission of the application for registration.
• If the state and tax registration of the enterprise is not performed within 3 work days or the applicant has not been informed about any lack or motivated refusal of registration for the enterprise it will be considered as duly registered.     
• The authorizing tax body is obliged to issue the certificate on state and tax registration immediately according to the applicant’s request.
• The fee for registration of enterprises is:
  a) For registration of association of joint responsibility -  60 GEL;
  b) For registration of the Company with special partnership - 80 GEL
  c) For Limited Liability Company  - 160 GEL
  d) For Joint Stock Company  - 360 GEL
  e) For cooperative -120 GEL

• The individual entrepreneur uses his/her name and surname as a name of a firm.
• The individual entrepreneur or authorized person to represent the enterprise submits personally or sends by registered mail 2 notarized copies of the application in the authorized tax body according to the legal address of the individual enterprise.  

• The authorizing registration body is obliged to register the individual enterprise (to perform state and tax registration) within 1 workday from the date of submission of the application.  
• If within this period the applicant is not informed about the reason for refusal on registration the individual enterprise should be considered registered.
• The tax body is obliged to confer the identification number to the registered individual enterprise and issue the state and tax registration certificate immediately.