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The Ministry of Economy and Commerce has issued its Business Progress Report on the Commerce Sector for October 2017. The report indicated the registration of 2062 new companies including 1596 main commercial records and 466 branch commercial records.
 
Limited liability companies accounted for 62% of new commercial records followed by limited liability companies in the category of single-person companies at 27% while 10% of new companies were registered in the category of Individual Corporations.
 
Contracting companies topped the list of most common activities in October, with 254 commercial records issued in this field. 163 commercial records were issued for grocery stores and supply shops while 155 records were issued for restaurants, cafeterias and ice cream shops. The field of public trading followed with 136 records while transaction clearance and services accounted for 127 records.
 
The report pointed out that a total of 7747 commercial licenses were issued, amended or renewed in October. 1481 new commercial licenses were issued while 1046 were modified and 5220 commercial licenses were renewed.
 
A total of 301 companies closed in October, representing 14.5% of newly registered companies.
 
Regarding write-off activities, contracting companies topped the list at 35%, followed by public trading companies at 24%. Trading in construction materials followed at 22% while trading in electrical appliances and electronics followed in third place each at 19%.

The report has indicated that the total number of transactions that took place during October 2017 at the ministry’s branches reached 37340 transactions.
 
In the area of intellectual property rights, the report indicated that 41 new patent applications were issued in October while 187 patent applications were renewed. In addition, 4019 trademarks have been registered during October, while 8 certificates were issued in the field of copyright and related rights.