Forming a GmbH at the click of a mouse

31. March 2025

With FIRMADIGITAL.AT, the law firm PHH offers an AI-supported platform for the formation of GmbHs, which is designed to be faster and cheaper than a conventional formation.

The tortoise was yesterday, the leopard is today. This is how the Viennese law firm PHH illustrates the difference between normal GmbH formation and the new, fast method offered by FirmaDigital.at on its website. The inventors of the FirmaDigital.at platform, which has been on the market for a few weeks, promise that what used to take four to six weeks can now be done in just a few days with the AI-supported platform – a quantum leap for company founders. The idea was born last year in a conversation between IT expert Felix Häusler and lawyer Philip Rosenauer. The time between the birth and realization of the idea was a very intensive one: “We spent many days and nights building the tool,” says Rosenauer. The result is also well thought out.

We are aware that AI will change the service industry all over the world. So far, however, start-ups have cut their teeth on old businesses such as doctors, notaries or lawyers, continues Häusler, who also founded the messenger start-up Grape. However, this is exactly what FirmaDigital.at did not want to happen, which is why they chose an approach with a partnership-based set-up. After all, they wanted to avoid problems similar to those that the start-up notarity had with the Chamber of Notaries at all costs. “That’s why we run this site as the PHH law firm and offer it exclusively as a service for our clients,” explains Rosenauer.

THREE BECOME ONE. As a company founder, you usually have three appointments before the GmbH is ready to be entered in the commercial register: one with the lawyer, one with the notary and one with the bank. FirmaDigital.at now wants to complete the procedure with just a few mouse clicks. It is intended to be a one-stop store. Included in the offer is the verification of identity, company name, contracts, a half-hour consultation with the lawyer, the company register entry, and the contracts can even be automatically forwarded to a notary via notarity. The service is available worldwide and the forms are also available in English. Bank checks can also be considerably shortened if the share capital is deposited in the notary’s trust account in advance. If you prefer to go to your own notary, you can do that too. In this case, it would be a two-stop store. FirmaDigital.at, however, promises to offer not only faster but also cheaper incorporation. PHH provides its user-friendly platform for around 1,800 euros, including advice; notary fees are extra. A conventional formation of a multi-shareholder GmbH currently costs a few hundred euros more. Of the approximately 5,000 GmbHs that are currently founded in Austria each year, around 2,000 fall within the target group of FirmaDigital.at. We want to cut off a large part of this group, says Häusler. Above all, the duo wants to appeal to digitally savvy young entrepreneurs. The two founders do not believe that FirmaDigital.at could take work away from young lawyers, because: FirmaDigital.at is also a market development tool for us. We might not otherwise have the clients we gain through it, believes lawyer Rosenauer. In other words, the tool should ultimately bring the law firm more work, not less.

FIRST MOVER. FirmaDigital.at has only just been launched, but Häusler and Rosenauer already have their sights set on the next stage of development: after setting up a limited liability company, they want to offer FlexCo incorporation, and service contracts are also on their to-do list. In any case, they see themselves as first movers in the German-speaking world, as Häusler says: “Because the law firm that is too late on this topic will probably really lose clients.