Setting up Vietnam office of foreign company?

In the big picture, you are going to have to do the paperwork (or have a legal professional do the paperwork) to register a company, you will also have to do quarterly reporting. In addition, of course you will have to hire staff and rent office space.

no disrespect, but that doesn't really answer my question.  what is involved in setting up a local office of an existing foreign company.    i do realise that yes i would have to rent office space and hire staff, but what are the legal processes involved in setting a local branch office up.

I used to help setting up rep. office for a German company. Now working for another rep. office of U.K group. Maybe I can help.

If you want, you can PM me your info and I'll hook you up with the right person!

That's pretty funny to see this thread... I was about to post the same!!
Today I've received a green light from my client to set up a rep office in Vietnam. Now I'm getting info about that.
Tons of info can be found on internet. Then you have some companies who can handle that. I'm asking some of them for a cost estimation. I've been told it's around 2000 usd.

Ngan Khanh wrote:

I used to help setting up rep. office for a German company. Now working for another rep. office of U.K group. Maybe I can help.

If you want, you can PM me your info and I'll hook you up with the right person!

Hi Ngan,
I've PMed you.

I have tons of experience servicing companies the same.

You 2 got PM. 

Not only open a foreign office, open a local office for a local business is a bloody pain in the butt for most local. There are middle men will handle all the job for you with a negotiable price. You can find easily or I can help if you need.

First of all get familiar with business forms as well as the industries which are permitted.  My instinkt tells me, that what you call an office will not be right business formation. Neither is clear if you want to have as foreign investment or split national ownership.
Cost will vary a lot, depending on the touts you pay and the accompanying licences you might need.
In fact, if you can do it yourself, speaking the language .... It could be as little as 75 USD.
However, you likely have to take a tout.

Whatbis involved:
- $$$$$
- business and accompanying licenses
- a rough understanding of company formation and taxes
- depending on location/business line a god portion of time to burn
- finding business location and staff
- medical/police record checks
- Residence
- theoretical minimal time to burn. 7 calendar days
- max= 8 years +

It depends on which "what" you are refering to: what you need to do/have this or what demands by the law.
You can pm me for some info, I will answer some simple things but I can't guide you all cause I do it for living during 2 years, not only setting up company or representative office but also planning & implementing business plan/model. Besides, it's not that simple like Q&A and you'll be able to do this.

If you just want to set up a rep office it is about $1000 US and takes about 10 days. Each type of business is different. The rep office is a good starting point. What type of business is it. I was involved in doing this last year with an Oilfield Service Provider. PM me and i can give you more details. Use a local Lawyer, the quality is good and much cheaper. I can help with this.

Neil

Thanks for all the enquiries.

I guess the first step we need to do is ascertain if we want a representative office or an actual working entity as such.  We may need to look at the legal definition of what a representative office allows us to.

We are un umbrella organisation that is primarily focussed on developing online learning systems, but we also have specialised schools in our organisation that caters for training services for specific industries.  So we do a lot.  We also have a commercial interest in technology and learning systems such as educational radio/media systems.  We mostly work at government and large corporation level.

I'd be very happy if a representative office allows us to conduct trading as we do in Australia.  Our home base is in Australia and ideally we want a legal front end in Vietnam to conduct our communications and for contracts etc.  It sounds as though a representative office may be ok but I still would like to see what the definition and legal limitations such an office is.

Can anyone point me to a link that has this info?

Thanks

g

A rep office is always a rep office as it should be. So you can't really do anything else if you want to operate legally. Even you know all the steps but you will have time when being hassle with paper work that mainly caused by an officer which you wouldn't believe it in your life. For instance I have all legal paper work to swap to the new house registration but had been asking to provide more paper and they only ask one paper at each time, I was end up with 5 time to the bloody office. Not done yet, my new house registration was signed 2 years earlier than the time I get. All just because they do everything to get me tired that I have to pay money to the middle man. But you can try, look up in hcmc investment and planning department where you can register online and get all info you wanna know. I guess you might want some staffs and if you haven't had any one in mind then I would love to assist. I graduated from Australia in 1998. Working in hospitality, tourism, office assistance and interpreter.

Can you let me know the scope of operation of the company? I will send you a list of documents required for submitting the application for license.

Neil 007 wrote:

If you just want to set up a rep office it is about $1000 US and takes about 10 days. Each type of business is different. The rep office is a good starting point. What type of business is it. I was involved in doing this last year with an Oilfield Service Provider. PM me and i can give you more details. Use a local Lawyer, the quality is good and much cheaper. I can help with this.

Neil

Rep Office  is not allow to sell, so there is already a small Problem

Can you tell me if the following case is allowed:
I'd like to set up a rep office in Vietnam.
The company based in London is working on software testing.
The idea is to hire a project manager who will also be the chief rep office.
Then work with a Vietnamese company who will provide local resources with local contract.
I know this case was possible 5 years ago cuz a friend did it but I wonder about now...
Thanks in advance.

tranus wrote:

Can you tell me if the following case is allowed:
I'd like to set up a rep office in Vietnam.
The company based in London is working on software testing.
The idea is to hire a project manager who will also be the chief rep office.
Then work with a Vietnamese company who will provide local resources with local contract.
I know this case was possible 5 years ago cuz a friend did it but I wonder about now...
Thanks in advance.

.. and now, why not outsource from London to Vietnam directly? What  should be the role of the Rep office? I not see any sense in it.

We thought about LLC wholly foreign owned and partly foreign owned.
First one, you have to bring immediately 40000 usd.
Second one, you have to bring 40000 usd withing 36 months.

Then we thought about 100% vietnamese company but my partner doesn't want to hear about that.

Last case would be rep office for the reasons I've described above. It's an idea I got from my friend who did that 5 years ago.

If you have a better idea, please let me know it.

I think my partner in London doesn't want to rely on a Vietnamese company. He doesn't want to pay a Vietnamese company for that. He wants to keep control of all the projects and I got his point of view.
That would also be cheaper.
We basically hire our resources as a dedicated team.
I have a friend who can do that for a reasonable price. He will charge us 20% of each salary engineer.

gg1965 wrote:

Thanks for all the enquiries.

I guess the first step we need to do is ascertain if we want a representative office or an actual working entity as such.  We may need to look at the legal definition of what a representative office allows us to.

We are un umbrella organisation that is primarily focussed on developing online learning systems, but we also have specialised schools in our organisation that caters for training services for specific industries.  So we do a lot.  We also have a commercial interest in technology and learning systems such as educational radio/media systems.  We mostly work at government and large corporation level.

I'd be very happy if a representative office allows us to conduct trading as we do in Australia.  Our home base is in Australia and ideally we want a legal front end in Vietnam to conduct our communications and for contracts etc.  It sounds as though a representative office may be ok but I still would like to see what the definition and legal limitations such an office is.

Can anyone point me to a link that has this info?

Thanks

g

Yep, rep office seems to right.

tranus wrote:

We thought about LLC wholly foreign owned and partly foreign owned.
First one, you have to bring immediately 40000 usd.
Second one, you have to bring 40000 usd withing 36 months.

Then we thought about 100% vietnamese company but my partner doesn't want to hear about that.

Last case would be rep office for the reasons I've described above. It's an idea I got from my friend who did that 5 years ago.

If you have a better idea, please let me know it.

I think my partner in London doesn't want to rely on a Vietnamese company. He doesn't want to pay a Vietnamese company for that. He wants to keep control of all the projects and I got his point of view.
That would also be cheaper.
We basically hire our resources as a dedicated team.
I have a friend who can do that for a reasonable price. He will charge us 20% of each salary engineer.

That looks in opinion not more than a more or less frequent outsourcing, which can be done directly, no rep office needed. Your partner seems not to agree anyway, so there is not much chance, unless the partner agrees. Even then, yes, he runs a high risk of losing the overall control and has an additional man in the middle. I fear you partner is right

Then my question: is it possible to open a rep office and make IT project management with a local company. I know it was possible before but things easily change in Vietnam...

I reckon you might want to contact TMA as they are working with partners like you or if you want yhen I can connect you with them since my brother is working for TMA in testing network currently.

Thank you but I know a bit TMA and our business is too small to keep their attention.
I already have a potential partner for that.