Tips: Kabushiki Gaisha and Godo Gaisha

These are two major types of Kaisha (companies) in Japan: 株式会社 (Kabusiki Gaisha, stock company) and 合同会社 (Godo Gaisha, LLC).

Let's look at major differences between the two.

	株式会社 (Kabusiki Gaisha)	合同会社 (Godo Gaisha)
Expenses for incorporation
Registration tax	150,000 JPY	60,000 JPY
Notary Fee	52,000 JPY	0 JPY
Ownership and management	Investors are share holders, who own the company. Directors selected by share holders run the company. It often takes time to make decisions because the company tops are not the owners.	Investors are business managers, called "Shain." They own and run the company, which makes it easy to make timely decisions.
a public notice of settlement of accounts	necessary it costs about 60,000 JPY	not necessary
term of office of directors	10 years	no-fixed term
name of the representative	representative director 　代表取締役 Daihyo Torishimariyaku 　well known as "shacho"	representative "Shain" 　代表社員 Daihyo Shain 　often confused with employees
familiarity	most people are familiar with Kabushiki Gaisha	not as familiar as Kabushiki Gaisha
examples	many	Apple Japan Google Amazon Japan