Foreign Business License (FBL) in Thailand
When a business can't rely on BOI promotion or the Treaty of Amity to hold majority foreign ownership, an FBL under the Foreign Business Act B.E. 2542 is the remaining route. DeeMED manages the application from eligibility assessment through to license issuance.
Last reviewed: July 2026
When an FBL is the right route
The Foreign Business Act restricts foreign majority ownership in three activity lists. List 2 and List 3 activities can still be pursued by a majority foreign-owned company, but only with an FBL granted by the Ministry of Commerce, or by qualifying instead for BOI promotion or the Treaty of Amity. An FBL is the fallback route when neither of those alternatives applies to your business, or when your industry sits in a category BOI doesn't currently promote.
Capital and structural requirements
An FBL applicant needs a minimum registered capital of 2 to 3 million THB, and at least one Thai-resident authorized director on the board. Thai shareholding thresholds vary by the specific restricted activity, sometimes as low as 25%, more commonly 40%, so the exact structure has to be built around the activity you're applying to pursue, not a generic ownership split.
Which list your business actually falls under
List 2 covers activities tied to national security or Thai culture, domestic transport, antique trading, and similar categories that rarely touch a medical device, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, or supplement business. Almost every DeeMED client applying for an FBL falls under List 3 instead: wholesale or retail trading below specific minimum-capital thresholds per store, and most professional or advisory service businesses, which is exactly where importing and distributing a regulated product for the Thai market typically lands. Confirming which list, and which specific line item within it, your activity falls under is the first step, since it determines both the Thai shareholding threshold you're building toward and which of the 11 review factors the Ministry weighs most heavily.
How the application is evaluated
The Ministry evaluates an FBL application against the 11 factors set out in Section 5 of the Foreign Business Act B.E. 2542, covering considerations like national security, economic development benefit, job creation, technology transfer, and capital investment. This is a discretionary review, not a checklist a company can satisfy mechanically, which is why the application itself, how it frames the business's contribution to Thailand, matters as much as meeting the capital and shareholding thresholds.
Fees and timeline
The FBL application itself carries a 2,000 THB fee. Once granted, the license fee is capital-based: for a List 2 activity, 10 THB per 1,000 THB of registered capital, with a minimum of 40,000 THB and a maximum of 500,000 THB; for a List 3 activity, 5 THB per 1,000 THB of registered capital, with a minimum of 20,000 THB and a maximum of 250,000 THB. The Ministry is required to decide on a complete application within 60 days of submission.
DeeMED handles FBL applications end to end: confirming whether your activity genuinely needs an FBL rather than qualifying for BOI promotion or the Treaty of Amity, structuring the capital and Thai directorship the application requires, and building the case the Ministry's 11-factor review actually responds to. Talk to us before you commit to a route that might not be your fastest path to majority ownership.
