What is a shelf company?
The entity, what makes an individual company suitable, and what an existing registration does and does not give you.
Read guide →Buyer knowledge hub
Guides written for decisions, not for traffic
Each guide separates what Austrian law and official guidance establish, what is ordinary market practice, what Shelf-Company.at does, and what remains specific to an individual company.
How to use this hub
The guides follow the order of a real decision: understand the entity, decide whether acquiring one is right for you, transact correctly, then get the company operating. Reading them in that order takes about half an hour and will make a first conversation with a consultant considerably shorter.
Every guide states when it was published, when it was last updated, what review it has had and which primary sources were consulted, so you can judge how much weight to give it.
These guides describe a general framework. Nothing in them is legal, tax or banking advice, and no statement about an individual company can be drawn from them.By decision stage
Nine guides, in the order the decision happens.
The hub grows from observed buyer questions and search demand, not from a publishing quota. A guide is added when it answers a question that a buyer genuinely has to resolve.
The Austrian GmbH explained
Shareholders, managing directors, the Commercial Register, share capital, and what a change of ownership actually changes.
Read guide →Shelf company vs new formation
The decision criteria that determine whether an acquisition premium is worth paying for your requirement.
Read guide →Managing directors and representation
Who may act for the company, and the four distinct concepts that international buyers most often conflate.
Read guide →Ownership transfer and the notary
Why the transfer takes notarial form, the stage-by-stage sequence, and what happens between signing and the register update.
Read guide →Verification and evidence
What a company-specific evidence pack has to establish, and what a point-in-time review can never cover.
Read guide →VAT, banking and trade licence
Why these three positions are granted by third parties rather than transferred with the company.
Read guide →Post-acquisition operational setup
The six workstreams that turn an acquired entity into a business that can invoice, employ and operate.
Read guide →Glossary
Every Austrian corporate, notarial and compliance term used on this website, with its German source term.
Read guide →
Your Austrian adviser
Direct access
Still deciding whether to acquire or to form?
That question is usually settled in one conversation about what the company actually has to do, and by when. Where a new formation is the better answer, we will tell you.
What the first conversation covers
- Intended business activity and start window
- Ownership, management and residence context
- Whether an existing company beats a new formation
- Which company attributes are genuinely required
- How the cost would be composed for your case
What it never asks for
- Passports or identity documents
- Source-of-funds evidence
- Any document upload on this public website