The Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC) has launched a new “special services offering” to JSE-listed entities and their subsidiaries, describing the initiative on Friday as an effort to contribute towards the international competitiveness of the South African bourse by providing companies with expedited services from the Sandton-based exchange.

The offering would, according to the commission, enable entities to effect share capital changes, name changes, ring-fencing inclusions, amendments and general changes to memorandums of incorporation at the JSE.

The CIPC further outlined in a guidance notice to listed companies on Friday that the expedited process would be largely electronic and would require urgent JSE-related applications to be lodged via dedicated email addresses.

Speaking at the launch on Friday, JSE CEO Nicky Newton-King said the in-house CIPC hub would make it easier for issuers of shares to comply with CIPC and JSE requirements.

She added that it would provide the commission with insight into the challenges facing the companies that were “driving the economy”.

“This [service] will enable issuers to use the JSE as a one-stop shop and ensure that they comply under the Companies Act.

“There is a need for a company to comply with [this] set of rules, but it’s not about making it more difficult – it should be easy to comply,” she commented.

CIPC commissioner Astrid Ludin added that the launch of the service offering was an indication of the commission’s ambition to provide an improved service for large entities, for which time was “of the essence”.

“This is an initial offering that will be staffed by two or three people and will expand over time. Having a physical office is symbolic, as it allows people to physically liaise [with the commission], thus improving accessibility. [Communication] will, [however] be primarily electronic,” she noted.

Meanwhile, as part of a larger modernisation process, the CIPC outlined that it would continue the roll-out of a self-service biometric company registration process, which allowed individuals to register new enterprises at nationwide self-service terminals.

Touch-screen technology and biometric fingerprint identification allowed a customer to register a company without a name reservation for R125 as soon as the fees were reflected in the CIPC bank account.

The registration certificate was then emailed to the customer’s selected email address.

The terminals, which were aimed at young entrepreneurs and small business owners, would also enable individuals to create or change customer codes, reset passwords, file yearly returns and make financial year-end changes.

After recently being accredited by the Department of Trade and Industry as an accredited black economic-empowerment (BEE) verification agency, new enterprises registered on the self-service terminals were now able to receive BEE certificates.

The Carlton Centre, in Johannesburg’s central business district, currently hosted 13 self-service terminals, while a similar centre had been piloted in the Sunny Park shopping centre, in Pretoria.

In excess of 500 company registration applications were currently being received at the Pretoria office on a weekly basis.

“The CIPC has introduced biometric verification in partnership with the Department of Home Affairs, which does away with the need for any common form of identification. The CIPC also allows for instantaneous exchange of information with the South African Revenue Service so that a tax number is generated when a new company is registered,” Ludin explained.