Company Register / 2014 38% open (avg.)

Companies House, the public body responsible for maintaining company registers in the UK, has since June 2012 made available a subset of the fields of the register for all companies for bulk download as monthly 'snapshot', at no charge and on an open basis. The subset of the information is documented at http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/toolsToHelp/pdf/freeDataProductDataset.pdf and meets the minimum requirements of the definition of this element of the OKFN Census 2013. Full information from individual company registers remains subject to payment. Data is timely and was last updated on Dec, 1st 2014.

Data is provided via national open data repository. It includes name, identification number, fiscal registration number, areas of activity and locality (not full address).

Data is updated quarterly. Old versions of the dataset remain available.

The data available on Data Portal India is easily downloadable and available in bulk. Most importantly it is machine readable. There is unrestricted access to the basic data. Data has been shared under National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy – 2012 (NDSAP-2012). This was a unique initiative taken by Govt of India. The objective of the policy is to facilitate access to Government of India owned shareable data and information in both human readable and machine readable forms through a network all over the country in a proactive and periodically updatable manner, therefore, permitting a wider accessibility and use of public data and information. Data is also avialable in http://www.mca.gov.in/MCA21/Master_data.html. The interface of the websites is user friendly. The ministry website while registering for a company, also suggests whether that name is available or not and the probable names that can be chosen

Fields available: http://hotell.difi.no/api/html/brreg/enhetsregisteret/fields

Further data may be made available in the future: http://www.brreg.no/nyheter/2012/06/datasett_enhetsregisteret.html

Edit: added that the data - though in a minimal form, compared to what's registered with the government, is available under a free license from data.norway.no , using the firstmentioned url above.

Edit: amended main URL so it goes directly to dataset and not to search.

Edit: the data set is updated nightly.

Publisher is "The Brønnøysund Register Centre", but the technical publisher is Difi (who receives the data-export and makes it available). (Reviewer-comment 2014)

You can search company register data from here: http://gcis.nat.gov.tw/moeadsBF/bms/report.jsp?method=first&agencyCode=allbf&showGcisLocation=true&showBusi=true&showFact=false The data include register, registration changing or dissolution in every month, in different cities between 2006 and now.

Last data are from July. The publisher does not specify, how often they update the data.

This data corresponds to 2011 and accounts for about 80 to 90% of companies in the country, which are micro, small and medium companies.

Metadata on the dataset is provided as DDI and RDF.

A log in and password is needed, which is why the data is not available. Bulk data is available for payment,

new localised IM OGL based on UK OGL -- data also webscraped by opencorporates.com

Data is available for free; no charge is required for any site functions.

A search interface to access the full data is available at the link given.

The data is not machine-readable because most important data, including data on company ownership and directors, is in PDFs and/or DjVu format.

The data is not available in bulk. Transparency International Georgia (an NGO) runs a web scraper which republishes the information in a machine-readable format with an API at http://www.companyinfo.ge/en/ . However, this information is not timely, and the Public Registry recently installed a CAPTCHA which prevents the web scraper from functioning.

All government-generated information in Georgia is legally in the public domain. However, there is no licensing information included with this data set.

The data set pulls directly from the central database of company registrations and is therefore always up to date.

Basic registered company data is published monthly to the Federal open data catalogue, where it can be used in bulk or via API.

There is also a dataset for the Australian Business Register at http://data.gov.au/dataset/abn-bulk-extract

Enterprise register's data is published in a structured form and updated daily. Benefits from timely updates: organisations requiring Enterprise register statistics can just grab the file instead of filing official requests, thus saving time and effort.

Files include basic information about enterprises but lack more detailed information. Enterprise register sells access to detailed information to commercial companies for a considerable fee (in tens of thousands EUR) which can resell this information to everyone else.

This is one of the best open data examples in Latvia, but it is not easy to find - you have to know the URL or the path to take through register's page in order to find reference to open data.

• Name: Repository of Korea's Corporate Filings
• Coverage: Company profiles, Changes in Capital, Major Stockholders, Main Businesses , Sales Composition, Summarised balance sheets, summarised income statements, XBRL Financial Statements
• Terms of use: http://dart.fss.or.kr/jsp/popup/apiTermService.jsp (Freely available only for non profit use, with attribution, share-alike.)

Data is available for personal use: "publication of the whole database, or of parts of it, by any means is strictly forbidden". http://zefix.admin.ch/hrweb/eng/about.htm

Information about companies is available, though an online database.

The Industry and Commerce Chamber of Benin CCIB provides with a detailed and up-to-date list of companies per regions.

Data available via web services. Registration required.

A human-readable web interface is also available at http://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/search

Free search http://www.ytj.fi/english/yrityshaku.aspx?path=1704;1736;2052&kielikoodi=3 by Business ID, Company form, LEI code.

See the discussion in Finnish http://avoindata.net/150/onko-yritystietojarjestelman-datojen-avaaminen-tyon-alla

Details about Accessing CRO Data are explained here: https://www.cro.ie/en-ie/Services/Access-to-CRO-Data

Data available via free API for which signup is required at https://services.cro.ie/overview.aspx.

Bulk data are available on a cost recovery basis "The CRO supplies, under licence, data in bulk format for high volume users of our data. The data concerned is basic company information in respect of all companies on the register. Daily updates of the data may be downloaded via the internet - a password is assigned to a Licensee to facilitate this. The fees for the daily data update service are below. Copies of all scanned documents received by CRO can also be made available at a cost of €63,360 per annum."

The companies register is managed by the chamber of trade and industry. He is working to make the registry available for free

There are three ways to obtain this data. One is as an Open Data CSV file that is updated monthly and available for free after registration, in this dataset however you can only see the publicly available information about the companies. There is also a daily updated webservice where users pay 50 euro per 2000 queries. And there is a full xml catalogue, daily updated with more up-to-date information on the companies (current and stopped). For this you pay a license of 75000 euro per year.

License in not clearly open

The whole bulk data is available online under highly restricted conditions for 65 994 € and 255 € per update. http://www.sirene.fr/static-resources/doc/redifsirR2a.pdf

Information is only available for a fee. Very sparse information avialable as open data (http://www.bolagsverket.se/om/oss/vidareutnyttjande/oppna-data-1.10631) but doesn't include basics such as address.

Data is accessible in bulk form only on special arrangement. Or it can be just scraped from web. License for the data is not clearly stated so "no" is filled.

Initial searches for company name, trademarks and patents are free of charge. More in-depth information is sold on a subscription basis. Website is being reviewed at the moment, but no indication the fee model is changing.

The license on the website is copyrighted under the government.

Brief Description: Russian companies registry data is available for everybody via http://egrul.nalog.ru website. This data is up to date, free, but limited by company name, it's unique registration number, address and short list of latest registration actions without details. Any finacial information provided with fee or via commercial services. Most important issues: 1. No machine readable data 2. No bulk download 3. No open licenses 4. Data hidden behind captcha 5. Public information is very limited Step by step explanation 1. Does the data exist? Yes, data published via http://egrul.nalog.ru and also known as available via a few commercial operators. 2. Is data in digital form? Yes, data available via website egrul.nalog.ru 3. Publicly available? Yes, this data is publicly available. We don't need FOI request to get it. 4. Is the data available for free? Yes. Following data available for free: - unique numbers: INN and OGRN - name - address - registration operations 5. Is the data available online? Yes. Data available at http://egrul.nalog.ru 6. Is the data machine readable? No, public data is not machine readable 7. Available in bulk? No 8. Openly licensed? No, this data is public domain data but no open license available. 9. Is the data provided on a timely and up to date basis? Yes, this information updated frequently, on daily basis.

Data is held by the Companies Office of Jamaica. It is possible to manually search for companies by name, which will provide the company number, name, industry and status but no further details. There is no browsable or downloadable dataset.

As per https://www.orcjamaica.com/profile/:

Documents are currently recorded manually in registers and in computer based databases...Customers are at present able to access company names via the computer and within the next 2 years will be able to view documents of all companies and registered trade marks

Access to company data in Brazil - on a federal level - is very limited. In order to access data, one needs to know the identification number of the company. There is no service where people can search for the identification number if they only know the name. On a state level every state has a company registration agency that maintains company data. Data for the state of São Paulo is available here: https://www.jucesponline.sp.gov.br/Default.aspx

The data seems solely accessible through a web-based search form. It is unclear how often it is updated. It does not seem possible to download the whole registry in bulk. No indication seems to exist on a possible fee to obtain either details or the whole registry, so the data was considered as accessible free of charge as basic information after the web-based query is available for free. The information is not openly licensed as the website seems to be the property of the institution.

No information about license, therefore the data is considered non-open. Industry: http://www.tunisieindustrie.nat.tn/fr/dbi.asp Services : http://www.tunisieindustrie.nat.tn/fr/dbs.asp

No Changes from 2013

The purpose of the sharing of this information is to recruit more investors. So several data are missing (companies under 100 millions as turnover per year). The entire sector of Mining is missing also so we don't know who is extracting gold or diamond in the country.

Because Canada is a federation of provinces and territories, these data would be considered incomplete, as companies are also registered, sometimes exclusively at those jurisdictions. A complete picture would require going to each jurisdiction and assessing their degree of openness. This response is solely for the federal / national level. These data are however generally incomplete, are destroyed every 7 years as per the tax act and are inconsistently managed. They are also not easily available to the public. While these national scale data meet many of the OKFN criteria, the fact that they are incomplete, inaccurate and destroyed every seven years is problematic, especially regarding transparency and investigations into money laundering. Furthermore, they are not readily accessible by the data producer, you can find a company but not a list of all the companies. Also, the Corporations Canada database "does NOT include corporations created under financial legislation (such as financial institutions, insurance companies or loan and trust companies) or those created under provincial/territorial legislation or corporate legislation from another jurisdiction." See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_company_registers#Canada (No change from 2013)

Access to the corporate registry is only possible through several private actors who obtained a license from the government to sell access to the data (http://www.justiz.gv.at/web2013/html/default/2c9484852308c2a601240b693e1c0860.de.html). Among these service providers is now also the fully state-owned Wiener Zeitung, the Republic's official gazette, which provides free access on http://firmenmonitor.at. There are several private operators that, like the Wiener Zeitung, offer free access to corporate ownership data, applying an add-supported business model or charge for access to financial corporate data. But none of the free offers provides an official extract of the data, and there appear to be some discrepancies in terms of how current the datasets of various providers are.

No license can be found which makes it non-open.

Since there is no visible license on the website, we have selected "No" for the "Openly licensed?" category.

Datasets are provided on a timely and up to date basis according to deadlines regulated by the Act on the Court register. In practice this means that the register is updated whenever company registration procedures are completed.

The following data is available on companies: name, registration numbers, address, branches, main activities, capital, VAT number and any ongoing liquidation or bankruptcy proceedings.

The information is available but spread in different documents not easily machine processable (mainly PDF).

Platform provides a search interface for company information. Search is heavily crippled by CAPTCHA and delays on multiple searches.

The data available at national level might not include certain companies which registered at city/province level.

nothing changed in 2014

Despite the official description, only basic data is available for for free, while advanced details about a corporation (e.g. debt status, insolvency) requires identification and payment.

"Is it up to date?": there are several known inconsistencies. You can look individual entries up via the form online but are prohibited from downloading it. You can pay for the whole dataset which would be sent via email.

Limited data can be accessed via a web form (search). Bulk data is available under a very restrictive licence and for a fee.

There are database rights associated with the collection, pursuant to Copyright Law.

the data quality in terms of content is low because it offers little information about each register, te queality in terms of structure is also low because is only a .txt format file inside a zip and contains no metadata about what are the columns for each register. you can also find some incolpete list for the companies in the links: http://www.set.gov.py/pset/hgxpp001?6,18,543,O,S,0,MNU;E;106;11;MNU http://www.mic.gov.py/GuiaIndustrial/

The data is publicly available via their website, but querties are restricted to single entities and captcha. Obtaining the full database costs about 15 000 EUR. The website carries the mention "Copyright" by the Institution, which -- adding to the price -- makes the data non-open. Lastly, as one has to pay to access the whole registrar, data is not considered available for download in bulk (although the bulk automated interface in XML format is available for 15 000 euro/year).

Only change since 2013 entry is 'updated in a timely manner' being changed from 'Yes' to 'Unsure' because there are no indications of the frequency of updates.

A machine readable format of the public register listing may be found at Open Corporates (non-gov/third party source): https://assets.opencorporates.com/companies/bm They presumably obtain this dataset from scraping the public resource.

This website gives a more extensive list of limited companies which includes both state-owned as well as private enterprises, and across sectors (not limited to industry, as opposed to the previous link). However it only provides information regarding the company name, location, and the type of industries.

There is no information regarding licensing so according to the FAQ agreement it is considered not openly licensed.

I am not sure how frequent the data is updated as there is no information regarding this.

I have seen such list of business registration on MoC website. But right now, the website is down, probably under maintenance. If I'm not wrong, the file format is PDF file. In term of its update - it's not timely up to date.

It appears you can search the database for specific companies but it is not possible to get the whole dataset. Significant improvement on last year due to updated website.

Office of Company Registrar is responsible of data but they haven't provided those data in Open Format.

You have to register for an account to access the data.

Unofficial sources:

http://www.panadata.net/sociedades http://www.panadata.net/personas

The company register is protected by data base rights and might not be reused without permission. Original License notice states: "Das Unternehmensregister genießt Datenbankschutz nach § 87a ff. UrhG und darf insoweit nicht ohne Zustimmung des Verlags außerhalb der gesetzlichen Vorschriften genutzt werden."

No change from 2013.

Only individual records can be used freely; bulk data is limited by a statement "Users can get only minor parts of the databases (qualitatively and / or quantitatively) and to the extent provided in the context of available web applications. All other forms of retransmission or enabling the use of third parties (eg, publication of the third-party server or user, reproduction in other documents, etc.). Expressly prohibited. This prohibition applies to all forms of use that goes beyond their own use. In particular, the following practices are prohibited: the use of substantial parts (qualitatively and / or quantitatively) databases (eg reproduction structure databases, parts of the structure of databases, creation of public and private databases, etc..) ..." (see http://www.ajpes.si/Pogoji_uporabe) Bulk extracts are charged for - see http://www.ajpes.si/Registri/Poslovni_register/Ponovna_uporaba/Nadomestila for a scale of charges)

PDF, so not machine readable. No bulk data, no open license, charge to access data.

On SEC i-View (http://www.sec.gov.ph/onlinetransactions/seciview.html) users can against a fee print an online report on a company. No in bulk download is provided.

Data is not really shared : at directinfo.ma (the e-service side of OMPIC), there is a form to fill (web-based query) where to enter the search criteria. Only very limited information on each company is given; for any further detail, the visitor needs to pay. The pricing policy is available here: http://www.directinfo.ma/directinfo/DownloadDocPDFServlet?type_doc=tarif (PDF, in French).

Despite the fact that data is available under the Treasury and Economic Ministry, there is no public database available to the public. Some query mechanisms exist in order to find basic company information based on the name of the company or their tax id.

No change from 2014.

Data is available only on commercial terms. Some basic information (max. 100 searches per day) is available freely: the full dataset on company register is only available at a cost.

The information for publicly quoted companies can be found on the websites of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) (http://www.dsebd.org/company%20listing.php) and Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE)(http://www.cse.com.bd/company_info_url.php). It is to be noted that DSE and CSE is fully under government control. It looks like relevant information for all companies is gathered on http://www.roc.gov.bd/ but cannot see how to access the information. Also application available but not any registered company list available in this website.

In the US, corporate registration happens at the state level. The timeliness, availability, and licensing of this data varies among all 50 states. There is no federal dataset that contains all corporate registrations. It would be possible to create a unified open registry for all US corporations (even if only via aggregation from state ones) but this does not exist at this time.

Across those states performance varies widely and in many cases data is not available in bulk, is not machine readable, is not openly licensed etc. For more detail, see the per state summary on Open Corporates.

It appears that the data is available from the Chamber of Commerce but you need to email them to get access, but they have never replied. - Website: http://www.cci.ci/index.php/informer/information-economique-liste-des-entreprises-et-fichiers-de-prospects

An user account is needed to access the system. Accessing the a company file is not for free.

Company registration is responsible by Department of Business Development (DBD). DBD has provide "Online Services" which included Company Registration information inquiry service, but you need to obtain username and password.

The Patents and Companies Registration Agency (PACRA) is a semi-autonomous executive agency of the Zambian Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry. Its principal functions are to operate a legal system for registration and protection of commercial and industrial property and to serve as a legal depository of the information tendered for registration.

Data is submitted to PACRA online, yet the official PACRA website is not available, and it seems that the registry can not be accessed by the public.

Data does exist in digital form through the Registrar General office. How ever, I couldn't find how to obtain and it was not online.

http://www.registromercantil.gob.gt/ is unavailable on 19 Nov 2014 so unable to check

Only a register of foreign companies found with limited information. Information 2000-2008 available in Excel, 2009-2011 in PDF. No data available after 2011. Link to Information -http://www.economy.gov.lb/index.php/subCatInfo/2/143/8/3

There is data available but not in digital form. If a citizen wants the information, he/she must go physically to the Registro National to get it. There is a new format to register new companies, (http://www.crearempresa.go.cr) but the information available is only for companies that registered using it. If a company was registered before using the traditional format, it will not be available in the digital platform.

The Central Register of Macedonia gathers and administers company registries. Citizens can consult the registry (http://www.crm.com.mk/DS/default.aspx?MainId=12) but they need the number of the legal entity to get access to the data. Data is maintained timely (there is a related e-government service to business registration) but is not publicly available.

You can register a company online through the Office of the Administrator and Registar General's website so presumably the data is exists and is digital - http://www.oarg.gov.sl/

Rwanda's company register is held and maintained by the Rwanda Development Board (RDB). Their website is http://www.rdb.rw/.

The company register is not currently publicly available but I understand that work is currently underway to allow the RDB to supply this data to the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR) so that it could be published on the NISR website to provide public access to the data.

There is no list of registered companies, including name, unique identifier and additional information such as address, registered activities published as open data by the government or the company register (in this case Kamer van Koophandel) itself. Also it does not include detailed financial data such as balance sheet or other type of information. http://registries.opencorporates.com/jurisdiction/nl

The data is collected by the department of Deeds, companies and intellectual property of the Zimbabwean government (http://www.dcip.gov.zw/). There are forms on the site which can be downloaded for printing. There is also a project of Computerization which my indicate that the data is not in digital form.

Data is not available anywhere online but it is available upon request at the respective government office. There is a fee for the 'search' to de done and am not very sure in what format the requesting person receives the data. I am also not sure if the data at the offices iS fully digital though this could be possible and unfortunately I cannot verify in good time. [According to Ahmed - No changes from 2013]

There is a Registre du commerce et du crédit mobilier guinéen but it is not made available online by a public entity, only by a private company http://www.societeguinee.com/

Submitters comments: There is a names register online - but this does not provide additional information such as address etc. http://www.mtinamesearch.gov.bw/search/

Reviewers comments: It appears that Botswana does not use company registration numbers, but only register businesses by their name (http://www.gov.bw/en/Business/Sub-audiences/Small--Medium-Businesses/Company--Business-Name-Registration/#a35fb00617eb47dd93b0193e9d5eb0d4 - there is also a search form: http://www.mtinamesearch.gov.bw/search/). However they clearly register companies and must have an internal database or organized register. This register is seemingly not available anywhere online, so I'm amending the submission accordingly and marking this in existence, but not available to the public.

http://www.obfc.org.ls/business/

Contains summary statistics on 23100 companies registered in Lesotho but no data published

Nigeria's company register is not open. However, one will need a legal registerd practictioner to do a search on the company.

No change in 2014

The Commercial Register is required by law to enable any individual to access the records of any company (Article 2 of Commercial Register Law 3/74). The Commercial Register has a website ( https://www.business.gov.om/ ) that provides a number of services such as checking for the availability of a name, but it does not allow retrieving the records of other companies online.

It's available an industrial directory or a company register provided by SOFOFA, a private gremial federation (http://www.sofofa.cl/Net/DirectorioIndustrial/Consulta/WebForms/Buscar.aspx), but there's not a public government register of it.

None found. Website of Department of Licensing & Consumer Affairs: http://dlca.vi.gov/ does not work. Internal Revenue Bureau does not have information and Economic Development Authority: http://www.usvieda.com/ does not include a list.

No changes from 2013.

The Ministry of Trade and Industry launched a census in 2012 to establish a register of companies but there is no evidence of the data.

There is a project to implement a National Number for Companies and thus create a national registry but there is no evidence it has been implemented yet.

It is uncertain if the register exists, but there is an available API at http://www.gsis.gr/gsis/info/gsis_site/PublicIssue/wnsp/wnsp_pages/wnsp.html

The Business Registrations and Licencing Agency (BRELA) is the government agency that has started recently to list registered companies in Tanzania. The data, however, is in search form i.e. you can search using filters such as company name, date registered and registration number. I have answered No because the data does not indicate company address and registered activities. The database is available online at http://www.brela-tz.org/?section=companies&page=search