Investors from as far away as the Caribbean – A total of 42,450 companies founded in Serbia in 2016, hospitality and programming most popular activities

In 2016 alone, 42,450 new legal entities were founded in Serbia. Among them, the majority are restaurants and hospitality facilities (2,570 or 6%), followed by programming companies (1,902 or 4.5%) and drink serving facilities (1,750 or 4.1%), as shown by the research on newly founded companies carried out by CUBE. Unfortunately, around 7% (3,011) closed in 2016 as well, being erased from the register or in the process of liquidation.

Among the top 10 activities are also business consulting services, road cargo transport and funeral services, which placed sixth. Non-specialized trade continues to rate well, whether retail or wholesale, placing seventh and eight. The bottom of the top ten list is taken by taxi services and car services.

In terms of legal form, CUBE identified the majority as entrepreneurs – 78.7%, whereas limited liability companies cover 19.3%. Among the companies registered are 657 new associations, 30 new cooperatives, 12 new public enterprises, another 3 joint-stock companies and one new sports association.

In terms of regions, most newly founded companies are located in Belgrade (31%), as expected, followed by Vojvodina (24%), central Serbia (16%) and southern Serbia (11%), whereas the lowest number of newly founded companies was registered in Kosovo and Metohija – 116.

Residents of Serbia are majority owners in more than 97% newly founded companies, followed by Italians (201 companies), Chinese (193) and Russians (126). It's interesting to note that the newly founded companies include those owned by foreign investors from Uzbekistan, Botswana, Saudi Arabia, Belize, Bangladesh... but also two from Kazakhstan, ten from Iraq and thirteen from Albania. As for the countries of the region, there are newly founded companies owned by residents of Croatia (119), Bosnia and Herzegovina (105) and Montenegro (99).

Although it's hard for newly founded companies to get support from banks regarding financing, 2.4% have managed to do so. In 2016, 1,032 newly founded companies had banking loans approved.

Of the newly registered companies in 2016, the founding capital in 263 of them exceeded EUR 50,000, as shown by the CUBE research.

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