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I am located in India. I currently have a full time job and due to financial constraints, I need to continue this. I intend to start a firm that will provide Web Development Services. I need to run this, to generate funds and then setup a full fledged company and quit my job. But for now, I want to have a website of the company, get work, finish it and deliver. It is more like freelancing but on a wee bit larger scale and I want to do it more professionally. Plus, now I have a few developers as well who'd be contributing (as freelancers).

I just want to know, is it possible to run this company/business without actually having set up a physical office? If required to register, what sort of registration would it be, keeping in mind that I will be solely responsible for everything related to the firm and other people could be just employees? If possible, kindly give some links from wherein I could get a detailed information about steps (legal/financial/functional) to get the company registered.

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No, you can not. See, pretty much everywhere you need an address for official documents (tax returns, court orders, someone sues you, contracts) or even just as registration address. That means you NEED a physical presence of some sort - but there are companies providing that as a service.

Now, physical office - what do you mean? You can set it up in drawer in your place. If you don't have too much paperwork, the office can be tiny. I know a lot of consultants that have their office in some folders in their living room. But you will need a legal address.

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Ok ! Got that. I guess the Virtual Office thing could work for me or maybe I can have it registered in my home's address – gentrobot Apr 11 '12 at 14:03
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Exactly. One thing to understand is that there is no such thing as a virtual business. A business is always some physical person running it ;) But - home is fully acceptable. I know a lot of consultants doing it, and I do it to (though my "home office" is 3 rooms now and overflowing). – NetTecture Apr 11 '12 at 18:55
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You can find information about registering a company in India at Ministry of Corporate Affairs website.

There are mainly 5 types of registrations here in India

  1. Proprietorship. (It looks like, this is the one you are looking for as you mentioned you want to be solely responsible for your company)
  2. Partnership
  3. Limited Liability Partnership (LLP)
  4. Private Ltd company
  5. Public Ltd Company
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