brand, business-registrationI am building a tool for an idea and planning to offer subscription based service to small institutions in my Country. My question is whether I should register a business name before I launch this product online or can I use a virtual company name and later register once I move out from my full time employment?
You should definitely register your business name before launching your product. In theory, if you are to launch your company before registering the name, then you are risking someone else registering it before you, in which case you will have to go through lengthy and costly legal measures to retrieve the rights to the name or in some cases may lose the rights altogether.
Registering a business name is cheap, even if its not with a larger more expensive corporate structure. At a later date you can then transfer that name to a different company structure once you have proven your idea to work.
When choosing a name, you also need to check your countries trademark database to ensure you aren’t infringing upon someone else’s trademark.
A product name and a company name don’t need to match up. Most of the time, they’re quite different. It’s quite common to rename apps in a startup phase as you figure out the identity of the app and its capabilities.
That said, if you plan on collecting money from this business, you’ll want to register a company in some state (if in the USA).
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