There are 4 basic types of business entities in the UK. I will not be including the plc, the Public Listed Company, as this is a Limited Company with more onerous legal and reporting requirements.
They all have their own individual advantages and disadvantages, which I will briefly discuss below.
This is a separate legal entity, which is registered with both Companies House and HM Revenue & Customs. It is run by the directors and owned by the shareholders, which don’t necessarily need to be the same parties. Shareholders can be individuals and other corporate entities.
This is also a separate legal entity, which is registered with Companies House and HM Revenue & Customs. It is run and owned by the partners, and can have corporate entity partners.
This is a formal agreement between a number of individual parties, which is registered with HM Revenue & Customs.
The easiest to set up and run, and just involves one party acting on their own.