Company registration

[KoHi]

Hi All Soloist,
I am hoping someone can help me out with my dilemma...

I have a registered company, ABC Pty Ltd acting as a trustee for AA Family Trust.
Now I am planning to start a retail outlet with view of franchising it in the future (Aiming High, Fingers crossed) and have recently lodged an application to trademark the name, example “Qwerty” under ABC Pty Ltd. However, my dilemma now is whether to register a new ACN as Qwerty Pty Ltd and be trading under the same ABN as ABC Pty Ltd or is it advisable to register the outlet as a new entity Qwerty Pty Ltd with its own ABN and ACN? I wonder what implications will there be with taxation as well as liabilities. Hope I have explained myself properly…
I am so in need for someone to enlighten me. =)

Cheers,
KoHi

[KoHi]

Originally Posted by petermark

You should register your company with Qwerty Pty Ltd, because ABC Pty Ltd is already a name than why another company will be under that info. So start your business with fresh name.

Cheers........

Hi PeterMak,

Sorry, maybe I should have ask if a trust can have multiple company names registered to it? So in this case, we will have ABC Pty Ltd and Qwerty Pty Ltd trading as as AA trust?
ABC<- AA Trust ->Qwerty

Or should if it should be better set up as
AA Trust -> ABC -> Qwerty (Parent comp as ABC)?

Thanks

[victorng]

Hi KoHi

You've got a few questions mixed in there so I'll have a go at dissecting them.

Above all, this stuff is all tax driven so you should talk to your accountant / tax advisor.

1. Multiple / joint trustee companies
Not sure why you would want to do this. You'd need to check that your trust deed allows joint trustees and I'm not sure there's any good reason to do this. But I'm no tax expert.

2. 'Qwerty' trade mark
Just because you've applied for the Qwerty trade mark doesn't mean you need to have Qwerty P/L. ABC P/L can own the trade mark (atf the AA trust) and license its use to franchisees. If ABC is going to trade as 'Qwerty', it'll probably need a business name registration.

3. ABC P/L as holding company of Qwerty P/L
While ABC P/L can trade as Qwerty, it's not a bad idea to incorporate a new company, Qwerty P/L, and have ABC P/L as its holding company. The primary reason would be asset protection - e.g. ABC P/L holds the assets (including the Qwerty trade mark) while Qwerty P/L is the trading entity and carries the trading risk. In this way, the assets are somewhat quarantined from the risk that Qwerty P/L fails or is sued or whatever.

This is all tax driven though, so talk to your tax advisor.

Cheers
Victor

^ This isn't legal advice - I'm just shooting the breeze