Starting a business in Saudi Arabia: foreigner's guide (2026)

The Commercial Registration Law and Trade Name Law (Royal Decree M/83, 22 September 2024, published in Umm Al-Qura 4 October 2024) became effective 180 days after publication. The laws replaced the previous regional-registration system with a single national commercial register that carries no expiry date, and permitted trade names to be transferred independently of the business.

Saudi Arabia's Investment Law (Royal Decree M/19, issued 22 July 2024, published 11 August 2024) came into force after its 180-day notice period. It replaced the Foreign Investment Law of 2000 and abolished the mandatory MISA license for foreign investors in favour of a streamlined national registry, while codifying investor rights, incentive frameworks, and access to arbitration.

Saudi Arabia published its first comprehensive Investment Law since 2000, replacing the Foreign Investment Law and abolishing the MISA investment licence requirement for foreign investors. Foreign and domestic investors are now governed by a single framework requiring registration — not a discretionary licence — and the law bans discrimination between Saudi and foreign investors.

Multinational companies without a licensed Regional Headquarters in Saudi Arabia became ineligible to contract with government and semi-government entities (contracts above SAR 1 million). The RHQ Programme, announced in 2021 and targeting 480 MNC relocations by 2030, was backed by a 30-year 0% corporate-income-tax and withholding-tax incentive for qualifying RHQ activities.

The Companies Law 1443H replaced the 2015 statute and introduced a unified framework covering commercial, professional, non-profit, and family companies. It eliminated the SAR 500,000 minimum-capital requirement for foreign-invested LLCs and fully digitised incorporation, enabling company formation in days rather than weeks via the Saudi Business Center platform.

Saudi Arabia unveiled its National Investment Strategy targeting SAR 12.4 trillion in cumulative investment by 2030 and simultaneously announced the Regional Headquarters Programme requiring multinationals seeking government contracts to base their regional HQ in the Kingdom by 2024. This set the policy roadmap for the 2022–2024 legislative wave.

Saudi Arabia jumped 30 places to 62nd globally (from 92nd) in the World Bank's Doing Business 2020 report, driven by eight reforms including a one-stop shop that merged pre- and post-registration procedures, elimination of gender-discriminatory ID document requirements, a new secured-transactions law, and an enhanced electronic trade single-window — the most reforms the Kingdom had implemented in a single year.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman unveiled Vision 2030, a comprehensive economic-diversification plan that placed private-sector growth and ease of doing business at its core. The plan directly spawned more than 900 legislative and regulatory reforms, including the overhaul of the Companies Law, commercial-registration system, foreign-investment regime, and the introduction of digital business-registration platforms.

Saudi Arabia's first major update to its Companies Law introduced governance standards, minority-shareholder protections, and clearer LLC and joint-stock-company frameworks. Though later superseded by the 2022 law, the 2015 statute laid the groundwork for subsequent investment-climate reforms and reduced compliance uncertainty for foreign entrants.

Saudi Arabia enacted its first dedicated Foreign Investment Law (Royal Decree M/1), opening most economic sectors to 100% foreign ownership and creating SAGIA as the licensing authority for foreign investors. The law introduced the 'negative list' of prohibited sectors and established the foundational legal framework for foreign business entry that would govern Saudi Arabia for the next 24 years.