Public Procurement

Although corporate and consumption taxation issues are those you will have to deal with in your daily business activities as an SME, there are also a number of other taxes and rules that might have effect on your business dealings.  Some of these are introduced on this page.

Personal Tax

Resident / Non-Resident Status

Foreign companies engaged in business in Japan without a physical presence, but possessing warehousing and distributing goods in Japan, may be classified as having a permanent establishment in Japan. In this situation, the company could also be subjected to direct, as well as indirect taxes like Consumption tax.

Self Assessment and Payment

Enterprises engaged in domestic transactions (excluding enterprises that are exempt from consumption tax) and parties engaged in import transactions must file and pay consumption tax on their taxable sales by the methods and procedures respectively provided for them. If the amount of consumption tax on the taxable sales of an enterprise is less than the amount of consumption tax on purchases (calculated as being deductible by the prescribed method), the shortfall is refunded by filing.

Main points

The Japanese government at various levels offers subsidies to support SMEs. JETRO provides an overview of the programmes in place.   

Tax credits

In Japan it is possible for foreign SMEs to receive tax credits for a variety of expenses such as R&D costs.  JETRO provides an overview of incentives such as tax credits. Currently, these are targeting the following areas:

Japan offers many subsidies and fiscal incentives to attract foreign investment. Businesses creating regional headquarters or R&D Centres and projects, which can create employment opportunities in the perifery of Japan, will find some of these government measures to be particularly favorable. Fiscal measures are usually determined on an annual basis and many run for a predetermined period, which is often extended. 

Foreign companies operating in Japan are liable for corporate income taxes only for that income which is coming from sources within Japan. In contrast, Japanese corporations are liable for corporate tax both on their Japanese source income and their foreign source income. 

The Special Corporate Enterprise Tax (Tokubetsuhōjinjigyōzei) was introduced from October 1st, 2019. To replace the temporary Special Local Corporate Tax. This new tax is permanent and will allocated to local governments in order to decrease the gap in tax revenues between urban and rural areas

Enterprise or Business tax (Jigyōzei) is a tax levied by the prefecture where your business operates. The tax is levied on taxable corporate income base and levied on value-added and capital appropriate based upon the pro-forma business size such as the number of employees and amount of capital if larger that 100 million JPY. If a company is involved in electricity/gas supply or insurance business the tax is impose on the adjusted gross revenue.

Local corporation tax (chihōhōjinzei) is a national direct tax. For the past years the rate was 4.4% of the Corporation tax, but was increased in October 1, 2019 to 10.3% as part of corrective measures against maldistribution of wealth.