Are Such Facilities as Virtual Offices, Incubators, Serviced Offices & Co-working Spaces Deemed ‘Suitable Business Premises’ for the Purposes of a Hong Kong Business Investment Visa Application?
Posted in Hadley Says…, Investment Visas, The Hong Kong Visa Geeza /
Hong Kong has an incredibly dynamic economy with the reality that the Hong Kong Immigration Department has recognized that entrepreneurs today have a wide variety of options in which to home their start up and early stage businesses.
Consequently, incubators, serviced offices and co-working spaces are generally acceptable to the Immigration Department as early homes for such nascent enterprises.
Indeed, applications for business investment visas are not often denied just because a foreign national entrepreneur wishes to surround himself with like-minded people in the cost effective business-friendly environment which incubators and co-working spaces afford.
Similarly, ImmD are prepared to accept the notion that a mere virtual office will suffice for the first few months in the life of a new business assuming that the business plan underpinning the application for a business investment visa provides a clear pathway to the creation of local jobs and with it an upgrade into more suitable ‘bricks and mortar’ type premises once the first employee has been recruited.
That employee, after all, cannot report to your spare bedroom or kitchen table to perform their duties for you!
However, suitable business premises are just one facet of the investment visa approvability test.
It’s important not to be lulled into a false sense of security expecting your visa to be approved just because you’ve made business accommodation arrangements which are generally acceptable to the Immigration Department.
There’s quite a lot more to it that just where your business lives.
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The Hong Kong Visa Geeza (a.k.a Stephen Barnes) is a co-founder of the Hong Kong Visa Centre and author of the Hong Kong Visa Handbook. A law graduate of the London School of Economics, Stephen has been practicing Hong Kong immigration since 1993 and is widely acknowledged as the leading authority on business immigration matters here for the last 24 years.
