How Can a Business Owner or Founder Move to the United States?

Direct Answer

There is no single U.S. “business owner visa.” Different paths answer different facts: investing in a U.S. enterprise, transferring from an existing foreign company, building a record of extraordinary achievement, or pursuing a later multinational-manager immigrant petition.

Potential Paths

• Path 1: invest in a U.S. enterprise — E-2: E-2 is built around treaty nationality and a substantial investment in a real U.S.
• Path 2: expand an existing foreign company — L-1A: L-1A may fit when a qualifying foreign organization transfers an executive or manager to a related U.S.
• Path 3: founder achievement — O-1A or EB-1A: A founder whose personal achievements independently demonstrate the required level of recognition may have an O-1A temporary path or, at a higher immigrant standard, EB-1A.

Facts That Change the Answer

• Path 4: multinational manager or executive — EB-1C: Where the U.S.
• Choose based on the facts, not the preferred acronym: Nationality, ownership, source of funds, existing foreign operations, prior employment, proposed U.S.