Choosing a Name for Your Business

You should choose a company name carefully to avoid infringement of rights of established business.  You should also choose a company name that complies with the requirements of the Companies Acts.  The Singapore Companies Acts states that a new company name:

• Must end in ‘Ltd’, ‘Pte Ltd’, or ‘PLC’ – private company names must end in ‘Ltd’ and ‘Pte Ltd’ while public company names must end ‘PLC’;
• Must not be similar to a Singapore-registered company’s name – names that differ from existing companies only with “&”, “and” or the capitalizations of the letters will not be accepted.  A name that is only slightly different from one that is already registered will be accepted;
• Must  not be offensive; and
• Must not contain sensitive words.  You are required to seek permission if your company name contains the following words:

Abortion
Anzac
Apothecary
Architect
Association
Assurance (and assurance broker and assuror)
Authority
Benevolent
Board
British
Building Society
Chamber of Commerce (or Chamber of Industry or Chamber of Trade, Chamber of Training, Chamber of Enterprise)
Charity (and charitable)
Charter (and chartered
Chemist (and chemistry)
Chirpodist
Chiropractor
Contact lens
Co-operative
Council
Credit Union
Dental (and dentist and dentistry, dental surgeon and dental practitioner)
Deposit
Dietician
District Nurse
Drug (and druggist)
Duke
England (and English)
European
Federation
Foundation
Friendly Society
Fund
Geneva Cross
Giro
Government
Great Britain
Group
Health Centre
Health Service
Health Visitor
Her (and His) Majesty
Holding
HPSS (Health and Personal Social Services)
HSC (Health and Social Care)
Industrial and Provident Society
Institute (and Institution)
Insurance (and insurance broker and insurer)
International
Ireland (and Irish)
King
Medical laboratory
Midwife (and midwifery)
National
NHS
Nurse (and nursing)
Occupational therapist
Olympiad(s), Olympian(s), Olympics(s)
Optician
Optometrist
Orthopist
Paralympic(s), Paralympiad(s), paralympian(s)
Patent (and patentee, Patent Office, Patent Agent)
Pharmacist (and pharmaceutist, pharmaceutical, pharmacy)
Phyisiotherapist
Police
Polytechnic
Post Office
Pregnancy termination
Prince (and princess)
Queen
Radiographer
Red Cross, Red Crescent, Red Lion and Sun;