Switzerland

Swiss companies come from the federal commercial register (Zefix), the federal UID register, the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SOGC) and the cantonal register excerpts. All five sources are official and free. Four of them need no account; the Zefix REST API needs free credentials that the operator enters once (see Activating Zefix REST).

Sources#

Source	Gives	Access	Default
`lindas_zefix` (Zefix on LINDAS)	legal name and its de/fr/it/en versions, UID, CH-ID, EHRA-ID, legal form, seat municipality (BFS number), registered address, purpose	SPARQL, no login; active entities only, updated daily	on
`uid_register` (UID register, BFS)	master data of every UID, also outside the commercial register (administrations, sole traders, associations, VAT-only entities): names, legal form, UID and register status, legal and postal addresses, register entry and deletion dates, VAT status and number, LEI	SOAP, no login; about 20 requests per minute	on
`zefix_rest` (Zefix Public REST API)	the full register record, deleted companies included: status and deletion date, nominal capital, former names, SOGC publications, head and branch offices, mergers, audit firms, link to the cantonal excerpt	HTTP basic credentials from the Federal Office of the Commercial Register	off until credentials are set
`sogc` (Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce)	the events timeline: incorporation, name, seat, address, purpose and capital changes, officer changes (who joined or left, with dates), mergers, liquidation, deletion; the company as its latest publication states it; daily change feed	Amtsblattportal public API, no login	on
`ch_cantonal_excerpt` (cantonal register excerpts)	officers and signatories: name, role, signing authority, since/until, residence, origin or nationality as published	public excerpt pages; robots.txt respected	on

Where sources disagree, the register (Zefix, UID register, cantonal excerpts) ranks above the gazette; every value keeps its source, and conflicts are shown (see Company data sources).

Identifiers#

Scheme	Example	Notes
`ch_uid`	`CHE-101.049.653`	Enterprise identification number; the check digit is verified. `CHE101049653`, `CHE-101.049.653 MWST` and `che 101 049 653` are accepted.
`ch_chid`	`CH02030216152`	The former 11-digit commercial-register number (CH-ID); `CH-020.3.021.615-2` is accepted.
`ch_ehraid`	`460530`	Internal id of the federal register office, one per register entry.
`vat`	`CHE101049653`	Swiss VAT numbers are UIDs. A company in a VAT group is taxed under the group's number; that number is not added to the members, so they stay separate records.

A company with two head offices (Nestlé AG in Cham and Nestlé S.A. in Vevey) has one UID and two register entries: the record carries both EHRA-IDs and CH-IDs, the entry with the lower EHRA-ID gives the name, and the second seat appears as an address of type other.

Fields#

Legal form: the eCH-0097 code as local_code (0106), the name in the canton's language as local_name (Aktiengesellschaft, société anonyme, società anonima), the ISO 20275 ELF code and the category. Examples: AG / SA MVII, GmbH / Sàrl / Sagl 3EKS, Genossenschaft QSI2, Verein H781, Stiftung 2JZ4, Einzelunternehmen AZA0, Kollektivgesellschaft MRSY, Kommanditgesellschaft CQMY, Swiss branch UNA9, branch of a foreign company JB25, federal administration 2XJA.
Status: active; in_liquidation (status BEING_CANCELLED, or "in Liquidation / en liquidation / in liquidazione" in the name); dissolved after deletion; merged when the company was taken over. local_value keeps the source's wording and since the deletion date.
Addresses: the registered address with the BFS municipality number, and the postal address (PO box) from the UID register.
Purpose: in the register's language (de, fr or it).
Capital: nominal capital, and paid-in capital from the SOGC.
Relationships: auditor, merged_into, absorbed, branch, head_office (Zefix REST).
Activities: NOGA codes, with their NACE class, when the UID register publishes them.
People (include=people): every officer and signatory the cantonal excerpt lists, current and former, with role (chair, director, ceo, managing_director, partner, auditor, liquidator, secretary, signatory, member) and the register's own wording, signing authority (individual, joint_two, joint, procuration_individual, procuration_joint_two, none), since/until from the register journal, residence and origin or nationality. Officer changes published in the SOGC are also in events with the people who joined or left. The register publishes no birth dates and Cormorant stores none.
Events (include=events): one entry per change and publication, with the publication link on shab.ch, the publication and journal numbers and dates, and details such as the old and new name or capital, the other company of a merger, or the people of an officer change.

curl

curl -s "https://api.cormorant.ch/v1/companies/ch_uid:CHE-105.909.036?include=people,events" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CORMORANT_API_KEY"

Freshness#

Field group	Refreshed after	Kept current by
core (name, legal form, status, address, purpose, capital)	24 hours	the SOGC daily feed
people	7 days	officer changes in the SOGC feed
events	24 hours	the SOGC daily feed
relationships	24 hours	Zefix REST

The gazette publishes every register change on the day it takes effect for third parties. Cormorant reads its daily feed and applies the publications to companies already in the register, without your request. LINDAS and the UID register update daily. A company that is not in LINDAS has been deleted or is not in the commercial register: the UID register and Zefix REST still know it.

Activating Zefix REST#

Zefix REST adds deleted companies, capital, former names, mergers, branches and audit firms. It stays inactive until credentials are set:

The operator requests credentials from the Federal Office of the Commercial Register (zefix@bj.admin.ch). They are free of charge.
In Mission Control, open Company data → Sources → zefix_rest and enter the username and password. Credentials are encrypted at rest, never shown again and never logged.
Switch the source on. The source card shows its health and canaries (Nestlé, UBS Group). A wrong password shows as error class auth.

GET /v1/companies/sources then lists zefix_rest as active.

Limits#

Cantonal excerpts are fetched only where the canton's robots.txt allows it. Where it does not, the source answers blocked and officers come from the SOGC events only.
Some French-speaking register offices write officer changes as prose, not as labelled lists. Cormorant reads the usual sentences ("n'est plus administrateur", "Nouvel organe de révision: …", "Signature individuelle est conférée à …"). Unusual wording yields an officer-change event without the people.
The UID register allows about 20 requests per minute. Bulk lookups take their time, and the register answers in the meantime.