MarkEarl

Hi, am looking for some general advice on expanding my UK business to the US. Hopefully i've picked a suitable place to post this.

I have a small software company here in UK, we already do some business in the US through agents/integrators but are missing out on a lot more opportunities that we know we can exploit if we had a US based office providing sales and support services.

We have had an investor approach us out of the blue suggesting they get involved to fund such a step. Before we get into conversations with him, it would be useful to have some idea of the options, pros and cons, for structuring it.

We are approaching the US trade services in London for advice, but there is nothing like first hand experience - has anyone done this, and can offer any advice please?

Thanks..
Mark

ian-mstm

Well, setting up a US business isn't all that complicated. For the purposes of this forum though, are you planning on hiring US-personnel to work the business, or are you looking for a visa for yourself so that you can move to the US to work for the business? Are you looking at this as an investment - which will result in an investment-based visa... or as a branch office type situation - which will result in an employment-based visa? There are pros and cons to each, so the more specific you can be, the better the responses you'll receive.

Ian

MarkEarl

Thanks Ian...

Will definately be recruiting US personnel for sales/development/support, but would like to keep options open in terms of either myself or my business partner moving over to run it. (I've lived and worked myself in the US before for several years, and have often regretted giving up my Green Card)

I'm not completely sure what you mean by "as an investment", and i think that is the point of the post - exposing those issues that we have to consider in terms of visa types.

My inkling is that it would not be a branch office type of operation - but a seperate organisation from the UK - mainly to keep the funded part of the business independant. And it may be simpler that way considering most of the opportunities are in Federal govt.

Mark