How does it work ?
This website is free of charge and is a complete, dynamic, effective and user-friendly tool, intended for anybody wishing to find out about a company’s true decision-making centre.
If you want to know more about the options it offers, please consult the following sections:
Simple Search
The simple search option allows you to start a search based on a company name, a VAT number, a group name or a family name. The result, where appropriate after displaying a clickable list including a large number of options, is presented in the form of a sheet containing information about the entity being researched. For a company, this sheet includes firstly identifying information (name, previous name, VAT number, legal form, postal address, telephone number, email address), key figures taken from the most recently published annual accounts (capital, turnover, total assets, employment data) and some extra information (sector(s) according to the Belgian classification NACE-BEL, joint committee(s) upon which the company depends). If relevant, the business group or groups to which the company belongs, are mentioned, as is the type of link between the two companies (parent company, subsidiaries, affiliates). It is possible to click on the name of the group which refers you to the clickable list of all the subsidiaries or affiliates of this group.
Two tabs enable you to view the known shareholders and any holdings the company may have, displayed in decreasing order of the total percentage of the stake. For each shareholder and holding, the nationality and the percentage held are displayed (directly and in total, including, in other words, the proportion held by intermediary entities) or, failing that, an order of magnitude (majority, minority, small, unspecified). Information is also provided on any links which the shareholder or the portfolio company may have with one or several business groups. Each piece of information is dated and, where possible, the source is mentioned. Two other tabs provide a summary in the form of an organigram of the information relating to shareholders and holdings (limited, for practical reasons, to the five main entities on each level) and a view of the location of the company (the headquarters and potentially any units other than the headquarters) on a map of Wallonia.
It is also possible to print out the information contained in the company sheet and/or to download it as a PDF. There is an option to personalise the choice of information to be printed or downloaded.
Advanced Search
The advanced search option, by selecting or combining different criteria, enables you to develop entity lists (companies, groups and/or shareholders). A first group of criteria relates to the type of entity being researched (company, business group, physical person, family) and, for companies, to their legal form (selected from a drop-down menu). A second group of criteria relating to the companies includes their location (municipality, postal code, with the search being carried out freely or by a hierarchical tree), their industry (using the NACE-BEL codes and headings, with the search being carried out freely or by a hierarchical tree), the numbers of the joint committees upon which they depend and their size (based on capital, turnover, total assets or employment data, with the search being carried out freely by choosing different size tiers). Several criteria can be combined. It is then possible to export the results in a PDF or an Excel file (with the option of personalising the choice of data to be exported).
Account and Personalisation
Creating an account enables you to benefit from certain extended functionalities, such as the retention of your searches, the downloading of your search results in a list in Excel format, the logging of companies whose development you wish to follow (with alerts being sent to you by email when there is an update on the companies) etc. To benefit from these extended functionalities, you need to register and/or log in when you visit the website.