The original idea of creating free economic zones in the UAE was to establish conditions for conducting a certain type of business activity. For example, the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC) was created solely for the exchange of goods and trade and the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) – for working with financial instruments. After several years, the management of free economic zones decided not to limit their range of potential client companies. Now you can open a store, clinic, beauty salon or others in the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC). Thus, when choosing a free economic zone, you should not pay close attention to its name. If you want to register a company there, then you need to check this option with the local government. Some free economic zones are willing to add new activities to their lists, if this does not generally contradict the very idea of this free economic zone.

Special attention should be paid to companies engaged in trade and registered in the free economic zone. Such companies may conduct direct trading activities only within the geographical limits of their free economic zone. If a company wants to sell products to companies registered outside the free economic zone, then in this case, a sales agent will be required as the official distributor. An agreement with a local company registered outside the free economic zone will be also required.

There are no taxes in the United Arab Emirates. If you start up a company, your responsibilities include only the annual payment of the license fee, the amount of which varies in each free economic zone.

Having a registered company address is one of the key conditions for obtaining a license. To obtain an address, a business owner can rent an office, sign a lease agreement for premises in a business center, or rent a flexi-desk in a free economic zone. Flexi-desk is a workplace in the business center of the free economic zone, which is allocated for use for 16-20 hours per month. The cost of renting a Flexi-desk is 3-6 times less than the cost of an annual office rental, which is the optimal solution for a start-up business.

An important indicator is the requirement to submit annual audit reports. The free economic zones of Dubai require audit reports, which is associated with certain expenses. The free economic zones in other Emirates do not require or have canceled annual audit reports in order to attract customers. An important feature is the size of the registration fee for opening a company. As a rule, if you are looking for a more economical solution, it will be reasonably to register a company in another emirate.

Due to the fact that the United Arab Emirates is not a party to The Hague Convention and it does not recognize the apostille, it is required to legalize documents in the UAE. Legalization includes notarized translation and its certification, certification of documents in the country of issuance, in the UAE embassy, in the country where the company is registered and further certification in the UAE Foreign Ministry. The cost of certification of one corporate document in the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs is subject to a state fee of 2000 dirhams.

The time to open a company varies from emirate to emirate. Companies in Dubai require significantly more time for their registration due to the large number of daily requests. Opening a company in Dubai can take from 2 weeks to one month. In other emirates, it may take only a few days to open a company. However, we must not forget that some activities require additional permits from local authorities (Ministry of Health, Ministry of Defence, etc.), which can increase the time period required for registering your company to several months

To open a company in the UAE, the formation of the authorized capital is required. As a rule, the standard size of the authorized capital is 50 000 dirhams. Depending on the type of activity, this amount may be higher. Some free economic zones do not require the physical transfer of funds to a bank account as well as the receipt of a confirmation letter from the bank about the transfer of capital. In a number of free economic zones, the physical transfer of funds is mandatory. For example, the DMCC requires a shareholder to deposit an amount of 50,000 dirhams into the company’s bank account.