Company Name Search MCA
A Free Screening Tool, Not an Approval
The Ministry of Corporate Affairs offers a free search of registered companies and LLPs. It is the first thing to do with any proposed name and it takes a minute. What it gives you is a view of what is already on the register. What it does not give you is a trademark check, a reservation, or any indication of whether the Registrar will approve your name. Treating a clear search result as approval is the most common misunderstanding about this tool.
How to search so the result means something
Search the distinctive word alone. Your proposed name is probably three words plus a suffix. Searching the whole string will almost always return nothing and tell you almost nothing. Search the distinctive element on its own.
Search variants deliberately. Singular and plural. With and without spaces. Alternative spellings. Phonetically similar forms, because a name that sounds like an existing one can be refused even when it is spelled differently.
Search without your activity word. “Foods”, “Technologies” or “Solutions” contributes nothing to distinctiveness, and the comparison effectively looks past it.
Search LLPs too, not only companies. The comparison is not limited to companies.
How to read what you find
The question is not whether an identical name exists. It is whether yours resembles something already registered.
Differences that generally do not save a name include a plural, a changed article, different spacing, a different tense, and the addition of a generic word. If your name differs from an existing one only in those ways, treat it as unavailable and move on, whatever the search screen shows.
Where a similar name exists in a completely unrelated activity, the position is less clear-cut, which is a reason to take advice rather than to assume either outcome.
Three things this search cannot tell you
1. Whether a trademark blocks your name. The MCA database and the trademark register are separate systems. A name can be absent from one and registered in the other, and a trademark conflict will generally block your application. Search the trademark register separately, in the classes relevant to your business.
2. Whether the Registrar will approve it. The resemblance test is applied with judgement, as are the rules on undesirable and misleading names. A clear search is a good sign, not a decision.
3. Whether a restricted word in your name needs clearance. Words such as Bank, Insurance, Stock Exchange, Mutual Fund or Asset Management need a regulator’s declaration. Words of national standing need Central Government approval. The search will not flag any of this.
The search does not reserve anything
Nothing you type into a free search tool is held for you. A name is reserved only when you apply, through SPICe+ Part A for a new company, and only once approved. Between your search and your filing, somebody else can apply for the same name.
If you have found a name you want, move on it.
What to do next
Search the distinctive word and its variants on the MCA database
Search the trademark register in your classes
Check for restricted words
Reserve through SPICe+ Part A, or file Part A and Part B together
Our article on checking name availability covers the full four-step screen, and our article on the reservation process covers the filing itself.
How Northrop LLP helps
Northrop LLP screens your shortlist across the MCA register and the trademark database, interprets near-matches against the resemblance rules, and files the reservation.