Today, 1Office Eesti, a firm providing consultations on local business services, launched an online portal for Commercial Register services that helps to simplify the procedure for establishing businesses in Estonia for e-residents. The firm hopes that at least 200 foreign businesspeople will register their activities using the new online portal.

“The average company owned by an e-resident leaves €4,300 per year in Estonia. Thanks to the collaboration with Commercial Registry, we can now offer improved services to foreign companies and easier access to the state’s e-services, which in turn will help to increase the volume of foreign investments in Estonia. The number of businesses registered by e-residents is on the increase. This year, we hope to help at least 200 foreign businesspeople register their business in Estonia through our company formation portal,” said Ragnar Everest, the CEO of 1Office Group.

Registering your Estonian company in 15 minutes

Today, foreign businesspeople can establish companies in Estonia in two ways: using a notary or through a service provider. In both cases, a trip to Estonia is required. People who are e-residents or have an Estonian ID card can also register their companies via the Commercial Register’s online platform without being physically present.

However, a company cannot be registered in Estonia without a local business address or contact person. The Commercial Register does not provide a solution for this problem and a service provider has to be found in the private sector.

The 1Office company formation portal that was opened today resolves this problem by providing a business address and contact person service. The portal is designed to be as user-friendly as possible – most of the options in the business registration application are auto-filled.

The applicant only needs to choose a suitable (available) company name, fill out a simple form, sign it digitally and pay the service fee. Thereafter the application is automatically sent to the Commercial Register, where the company is registered within a few days.

1Office provides its clients support in four different languages: Estonian, English, Finnish and Russian. The Estonian- and Russian-language user interfaces will soon be added to the currently operating English-language online portal.

In the future, clients will be able to purchase various support services via the online portal starting with legal consultations and ending with monthly bookkeeping – all in order to make the establishment of a business in Estonia simpler.

Public and private sector initiative

“This is a noteworthy achievement, which has not been discussed much to date. Estonia is one of the first states in the world that has given the private sector the opportunity to create an online portal which can provide clients with a service for establishing companies,” Everest added.

According to Aleksandr Beloussov, the Head of Business Reporting Systems Division at the Centre of Registers and Information Systems, it is understandable that businesspeople who have companies that are registered in other countries have various questions, not only about the establishment procedure but also, for example, about the taxation system.

“Based thereon, we have provided the private sector with the opportunity to register companies by using a online API service, enabling service providers to offer various solutions to startup entrepreneurs and to combine state and private sector services. We created the API service by focusing on the interests of e-residents, but generally, it was designed to make the service even more convenient for all end users,” Beloussov explained.