Company Information
Company Information
‘Company information’ is a broad term covering a variety of information. It includes basic information about a company such as its registered address, constitution and the nature of business. Company information also includes in-depth information about its products and services. But, company information has also come to mean financial information.
One way of understanding ‘company information’ is to adopt the life cycle approach. The typical corporate life cycle begins with incorporation and ends with liquidation or absorption or merger. Some companies manage to last longer than others, but rare are those entities that last for centuries. Les Henokiens is an elite club of companies that are over 200 years old. The current membership stands at 32.
The information that companies need to disclose varies as per life cycle stage. Incorporation is the first stage in the life cycle of a company. Worldwide, the government and quasi-government entities are responsible for incorporating companies. At this stage, companies need to disclose details such as their objectives and structure through documents such as memorandum of association and articles of association.
Once a company becomes operational then it needs to disclose information about its operations periodically through documents such as annual accounts and income statements. This process of sharing company information continues as long as the company is solvent. The contents and formats are specified by accounting bodies and the government departments.
In addition, the companies which raise money from the equity markets need to comply with the requirements of respective regulators. In the USA, the Securities and Exchange Commission is responsible for enforcing securities laws. The companies under the purview of SEC need to disclose information in specified format at regular intervals. Now most companies go beyond statutory requirements and voluntarily share more information with investors and analysts. The companies which are bankrupt or being wound-up are subject to a different set of disclosures.
Who provides company information?
The providers of company information include:
- governments
- quasi-government agencies
- regulatory agencies
- stock exchanges
- private information providers.
The government department responsible for incorporating companies in most countries is the registrar of companies. The registrar provides access to basic registration documents and annual returns filed by a company. The regulators such as Securities and Exchange Commission in the USA provide access to all the filings of a particular company. The stock exchanges also provide information on companies, which are listed with them.
Most of the information provided by the company and the government sources is unprocessed information. In recent years, several private information providers have begun to provide company information that is tailored to the needs of users. The company information provided by private information providers is focused, accurate and crisp, which saves a lot of time for the users.
The major trends in the ‘company information’ business are increasing sophistication in the way government collects and disseminates information. Now most governments allow companies to file documents electronically and provide company information to users online. The number of private information providers in this space is also increasing; leading to innovations in the way company information is presented and distributed.
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