Company Registration in Sweden - Business Starting & Setup

Sweden is one of the most progressive countries in the world. The economy of Sweden is heavily oriented toward exporting of goods. Nowadays the most essential features of Swedish economy are: a modern distribution system, excellent internal and external communications, and a highly skilled labor force. Due to the stability of economy Sweden has achieved a high standard of living.

Timber, hydropower, and iron ore constitute the resource base of an economy the Kingdom of Sweden.

Agriculture accounts for 1% of GDP. The vast majority of industrial output is provided bythe privately owned firms, of which the engineering sector accounts for about50% of output and exports.

The recession of Swedish economy was observed since the end of 2008 on account of the global economic processes which reduced export demand and consumptions. Nevertheless, in 2011 Sweden took the send place at the rating of the most competitive economies of the world.

It is noteworthy that the Swedish Central Bank, founded in 1668, is the oldest Central Bank in the world. GDP per capita rank of Sweden is 21 (est. 2011). The unemployment rank is 7.5% (est. 2011).

The legal system of Sweden is referred to Continental law. Nevertheless, in the established Swedish legal system there are evident features of the Scandinavian-German Civil law.

The legal system of Scandinavian countries developed in its own original way. In the 13th century the first written legal acts appeared.

There are also the features of Roman law in the Swedish legal system which were adopted in the 17th century. Due to that Swedish legal system was brought together with the law of Continental Europe.

The historical base for Swedish legal system was also the Old German law.

The noticeable event happened In 1734 when the Code of laws of Sweden (Sveriges rikes lag) was adopted. It was composed of nine sections divided by the object of regulation and included 1300 paragraphs: marriage, parents and children, inheritance, real estate, construction, trade, crimes, execution of judicial decisions, legal procedure, judicial system.

Thedistinctive features of the Swedish legal system:

• absenceof Codes systematized the separate branches of law;
• in spite ofthe fact that the law is the basic source of law, the court practice plays moreimportant role than in the countries of Continental Europe, due to the higherlevel of judges’ independence in the interpretation of rules of law;
• cooperationof Scandinavian countries in the sphere of law, the process of unification ofScandinavian law.

Swedish Company Forms are:

• Limited Liability Company (Ltd) – separate legal entity that can enter intocontacts, risk is limited to invested capital;
• PrivateCompany – not a separate legal entity, but an individual conducting business,no accountant requirements or capital adequacy, unlimited risk;
• Partnerships– separate legal identity, no accountant requirements or capital adequacy.Unlimited risk and must have at least two part owners;
• LimitedPartnerships – variant of partnership in which one partner if fully liablewhile others may limit the liability to capital invested.

A Limited Liability Company (Aktiebolag) is the structure that is often used when setting up business activities in Sweden. Investors can purchase a Limited Liability Company off-the-shelf or form the company themselves.

Usually there are no problems to change company form. In the majority of cases the enterprises are transformed from a Private Company, or Partnership into a Limited Liability Company.

A Limited Liability Company is a legal entity that can enter into contracts and own property. It can also be a party in legal proceedings.

After the registration LLC gets its registration number composed of ten digits which serves as its identification number and remains as long as it exists.