Taiwan’s Company Act recognises four company types — unlimited company, limited company, unlimited company with limited liability shareholders, and company limited by shares (including the closely-held variant). Sole proprietorships and partnerships register instead under the Business Registration Act and are not companies. In practice almost everything you will meet is a limited company or a company limited by shares.
Limited company (有限公司) — one or more shareholders with liability limited to their contribution, no board required; the most common SME form. Company limited by shares (股份有限公司) — capital divided into shares, can issue stock and raise funds, board required; used by larger companies. The closely-held variant added in 2015 caps shareholders at 50 and restricts share transfers. Unlimited and unlimited-with-limited-liability companies exist in the statute but are very rare.
Sole proprietorships and partnerships register under the Business Registration Act. They are not legal persons, and the owner bears unlimited personal liability. Both have a Unified Business Number, but a business registration has no paid-in capital field in the GCIS registry — that is normal, not missing data. If a lookup shows no paid-in capital, first check whether it is a business registration rather than treating it as a red flag.
Branch of a foreign company — no separate legal personality; liability sits with the parent. Limited partnership — created by the 2015 Limited Partnership Act, combining general partners (unlimited liability) with limited partners; common in venture capital and film projects.
The form determines which signals are meaningful. For a company limited by shares, look at paid-in capital and board structure; for a limited company, paid-in capital and shareholder contributions; for a business registration there is no capital figure at all, so weigh the owner, business scope and years in operation instead. Using the wrong signal produces the wrong conclusion — for example reading a sole proprietorship’s absent capital figure as concealment.
Company DD shows the registration form directly and applies capital tiering only where paid-in capital exists, so a business registration is never judged against a standard that does not apply to it.
Open Company DD →The form itself does not indicate trustworthiness. It changes the liability structure and what data exists: companies have paid-in capital on record, business registrations do not. Judge on years in operation, business scope and official penalty records instead.
Most often because it is a sole proprietorship or partnership registered under the Business Registration Act, which has no such field. Confirm the form before drawing a conclusion.
Yes, through a change-of-organisation registration under the Company Act. The registry then shows the new form, and the Unified Business Number normally carries over.