Moving an Executive to Spain Through a Subsidiary

At a glance

• Two instruments. A Spanish limited company (SL) owned by the parent, and an intra-company transfer (ICT) residence authorisation for the executive.
• Legal basis. Articles 73 to 76 of Ley 14/2013, processed by the Large Companies Unit (UGE-CE).
• Two routes. ICT-EU for managers, specialists and trainees moving from a company outside the EU; a national ICT for cases outside that scope.
• Core requirements. Real business activity of the company or group; a degree or equivalent, or at least three years' professional experience; and a prior, continuous working or professional relationship of at least three months with a group company.
• Duration (ICT-EU). Up to three years for managers and specialists, one year for trainees.
• Resolution. The law sets a maximum of twenty days from electronic filing, with positive administrative silence.
• Family. May apply jointly and simultaneously with the executive, or later.

Two separate projects: the company and the permit

Forming a Spanish company does not give anyone the right to live in Spain. The company is a commercial structure. The executive's residence is a separate authorisation, assessed on its own requirements. Groups that treat the two as one project tend to discover the difference when the company is ready and the executive is not.

What makes the combination work is sequence. The group establishes its Spanish presence, and the executive is transferred into it under a residence route designed for movement within a group. In the structure we see most often, the Spanish company is an SL wholly owned by the Gulf parent and acts as the host entity for the transferred executive. Planned together, the incorporation and the transfer file share documents, timelines and a single account of what the group is doing in Spain.

Setting up the Spanish subsidiary

A Spanish SL can be owned by a foreign company. Shareholders and directors may be individuals or legal entities, Spanish or foreign, and none of them needs to be resident in Spain. The formation can be completed remotely.

• Power of attorney. The parent's representatives sign a power of attorney before a notary in their own country, drafted to cover every act required. A power drafted too narrowly is the most common avoidable delay, because it means repeating the signature and the legalisation.
• Legalisation. The power of attorney and the parent's corporate documents follow the route of the issuing country. Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain and Armenia are parties to the Apostille Convention. The UAE, Kuwait, Iraq, Lebanon and Iran are not, so their documents are legalised by their Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then by the Spanish mission.
• Identifiers. Foreign shareholders and directors need Spanish identification numbers, and the company obtains its own tax identification number on registration.
• Bank account and capital. The company's account is opened and the share capital deposited before the deed is signed. Under Ley 10/2010 the bank must identify the individuals who ultimately own or control the parent, so have the group's ownership chart and the origin of the capital ready.
• Deed and registration. The notarial deed of incorporation, registration at the Commercial Registry and tax registration.

Our Spanish subsidiary service covers each of these steps. For the general process of forming a company from abroad, including the share capital decision, see our guide to forming a Spanish company without being resident.

The intra-company transfer: what it is

The intra-company transfer is a residence authorisation under Ley 14/2013, processed by the UGE-CE, the unit that handles the large-company and talent routes. It exists for one purpose: to let a group move a qualifying person from one of its companies to Spain.

There are two routes:

• ICT-EU, for managers, specialists and trainees moving from a company established outside the European Union. The maximum duration is three years for managers and specialists and one year for trainees.
• National ICT, for cases outside the scope of the ICT-EU route, such as the execution of contracts between Spanish and foreign companies, or professional relationships.

For a Gulf group placing a general manager or a senior specialist in its own Spanish subsidiary, the ICT-EU route is the natural starting point. Whether the role qualifies as manager or specialist is decided on the facts of the position, so the file must describe the role precisely.

What the transfer requires

In addition to the general requirements of Ley 14/2013, the transfer requires:

• Real business activity of the company or the group. For a newly formed Spanish subsidiary, the group's own track record carries much of this weight, so the parent's licences, accounts and operations should be documented properly.
• Qualifications: a higher degree or equivalent, or at least three years of professional experience.
• A prior, continuous relationship of at least three months, employment or professional, with one or more companies of the group.
• Documentation of the transfer itself: a letter or documents from the company setting out the move.
• Health insurance, public or private, with an insurer authorised to operate in Spain, and sufficient means for the executive and any family members.

Three months is a minimum, not a target. If a group hires someone specifically to send to Spain, that relationship has to exist, continuously, before the file is lodged. A new hire appointed in Dubai last week does not meet it.

Timing and the order of steps

The law gives the UGE-CE a maximum of twenty days from electronic filing to decide; if no decision is issued in that time, the application is deemed granted by positive administrative silence. We confirm the current position when we file.

The order that works best in our experience:

1. Decide the structure and the route together, before anything is signed.
2. Confirm the executive's eligibility: the three-month relationship, the degree or experience, and the documents to prove them.
3. Incorporate the subsidiary, with the power of attorney and legalisations running in parallel with the executive's documents.
4. Prepare the transfer file: the company's transfer letter, the group documentation, the executive's documents and those of the family.
5. File electronically with the UGE-CE, family included where they are moving at the same time.
6. Arrival and local formalities, which we manage with the executive once the authorisation is granted.

The most common delay is not the UGE-CE. It is documents from the Gulf, Iran, Lebanon or Iraq that need consular legalisation and were ordered late.

The executive's family

Ley 14/2013 allows the executive's spouse or partner, minor children, dependent adult children who have not formed their own family unit, and dependent ascendants to apply jointly and simultaneously with the executive, or later.

This matters. Under the ordinary family reunification rules, a sponsor must have resided in Spain for a year before bringing family. On the transfer route there is no such wait, so the family can move with the executive. Each family member needs health insurance, and the means requirement covers the whole family.

The executive's documents: two chains, not one

Many executives of Gulf groups are not nationals of the country where they live: an Iranian general manager in Dubai, a Lebanese finance director in Riyadh, a Turkish engineer in Kuwait City. Each holds documents from two systems.

• Documents from the country of nationality, such as degree certificates and the marriage and birth certificates needed for family members, follow that country's route. Turkish documents carry an Apostille. Lebanese documents are legalised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants and then by the Spanish Embassy in Beirut. Iranian documents are translated by a sworn translator and legalised by the Iranian Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Foreign Affairs before the Spanish Embassy in Tehran, whose services have been interrupted at times since June 2025; we confirm current arrangements for every file.
• Documents from the country of residence follow the Gulf route. UAE documents go through the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then the Spanish Embassy in Abu Dhabi. Saudi documents carry an Apostille.

Start with the documents that take longest. They set the timeline for the whole project.

Tax and accounting once the executive arrives

From incorporation, the subsidiary has its own accounting and tax obligations in Spain. Our accounting and tax service for companies keeps the entity compliant from day one.

For the executive, the special regime for impatriates, often called the Beckham regime, may be relevant. The Spanish tax agency lists employment contracts and appointments as a company director among the qualifying moves, provided the person was not resident in Spain in the previous five tax periods. The election is made on Form 149 within six months of the start date in the executive's Spanish Social Security registration, a deadline that is easy to miss during a relocation. Our Beckham regime service covers the eligibility check and the filing, and our Beckham guide explains the rules. We do not provide personal tax planning.

When the transfer is not the right route

The transfer fits when there is a real group, a real Spanish entity and a person with a genuine prior relationship with that group. It does not fit every case. An owner who wants to move to Spain to build a new business is usually better served by the self-employment or entrepreneur routes. An employee of a Gulf company who will keep working for it remotely, with no Spanish entity involved, may fit the international telework route. We assess this before the company is formed, so that the structure follows the residence plan rather than the reverse.

How Parastoo Legal Group works on these files

We are a Madrid-based immigration and global mobility firm with more than 100 companies incorporated and more than 400 approved residencies. On subsidiary-and-transfer projects, the corporate and immigration work sits with one team and one case manager, so the incorporation, the transfer file and the family applications move on a single timeline.

We draft the power of attorney to cover the whole formation, manage the legalisation chains for each country involved, and file the transfer with a short cover memo that explains the group, the Spanish entity and the executive's role to the case officer. We work in Persian, Arabic, Turkish, Spanish and English, by video call or telephone, and the first consultation is free.