INCORPORATION OF COMPANIES IN SERBIA - THE SCOPE OF PRESENCE OF ELECTRONIC AND TRADITIONAL PROCEDURES

Abstract

Increasing the investment activity of the existing companies and stimulating the incorporation of new companies is one of the factors of economic development. Many factors determine the scope of economic activity in a country, one of them is the procedure for incorporating economic entities. If we start from the assumption that the investor, domestic or foreign, has assessed the possibility of profiting in a specific economic environment, the first step in the realization of their business idea is the incorporation of their company. The legislation in Serbia provides an opportunity for a significant part of the procedure for incorporating business entities to be conducted electronically. Using this opportunity implies the knowledge of several laws related to the procedure for incorporation registration, as well as mastering new e-methods of communicating and running business. In this paper, we point out the normative solutions related to the e-registration of companies in Serbia and the problems in the practice that the founders encounter. E-registration of business entities entails the understanding of numerous e-instruments such as: e-documents, qualified e-signature, e-address, user applications, qualified e-time stamp and others. Memorandum of Association and other acts can be made in written or e-form, so the question arises whether all documents when forming a company can be in e-form and how an e-document can be materialized without losing legal force. Another legal obligation in our country, for some companies, is the e-records of beneficial owners. We will deal with these and other practical issues that the founders of companies in Serbia face in this paper.