Strategy · EU → BR
Four ways into Brazil — and why you cannot simply ship in your own name
Jul 19, 2026 · 8 min read
In short
No foreign company can clear customs or sell domestically in Brazil in its own name: importing requires a Brazilian entity with a CNPJ and a RADAR habilitation in the Siscomex/DUIMP system, which a foreign firm without a local entity cannot hold. That leaves four practical entry models. You can sell through an importer of record or trading company that owns the CNPJ, RADAR and licences and clears the goods for you. You can appoint a commercial representative who sells on commission under Law 4.886/1965 — but that law grants a mandatory termination indemnity of at least one twelfth of all commissions paid over the life of the contract, and it survives a foreign choice-of-law clause. You can appoint a distributor who buys, imports and resells at its own risk, taking on credit and consumer-liability exposure but also your price and brand control. Or you can incorporate your own subsidiary, usually a Limitada, which requires foreign shareholders to obtain a CPF or CNPJ and appoint a Brazil-resident attorney-in-fact to receive service of process, and typically takes around 30 to 60 days once documents are apostilled and translated. The right model is a trade-off between control, cost, speed and liability.
Start with the constraint that surprises most exporters: a company registered only in the EU cannot be the importer of record in Brazil, and it cannot sell there in its own name. Brazilian customs will only clear goods for an entity that holds a CNPJ — the national corporate tax number — together with a RADAR habilitation, the licence that grants access to the Siscomex foreign-trade system, now migrating to the DUIMP single import declaration. A foreign company with no Brazilian entity cannot hold either. Everything else about entering Brazil follows from that single fact, and it leaves four practical models to choose between.
The lightest touch is to sell through someone else's registration. An importer of record — often a specialised trading company — holds the CNPJ, the RADAR and the relevant import licences, and acts as the legal importer of your goods: it files the declaration, answers the customs channel, pays the duties and taxes, and releases the shipment, after which the goods pass to you or your buyer under a separate commercial contract. It lets you test demand without incorporating, and it moves the customs and tax mechanics onto a party that does them daily. The cost is margin and distance: you do not own the import relationship, and the trading company's fee sits on top of an already layered tax stack.
If you want a local sales presence without a warehouse, you can appoint a commercial representative — an agent who solicits orders on your behalf and earns a commission, without ever taking title to the goods. This is the lightest way to build a Brazilian pipeline, but it carries a specific and often-missed liability. Commercial representation is governed by Law 4.886/1965, and Article 27 entitles the representative, on termination without cause, to an indemnity of no less than one twelfth of the total commissions earned over the entire life of the contract. Brazilian courts treat that protection as mandatory and will apply it regardless of a clause choosing foreign law or a foreign forum. Budget for it from the first contract; it is not a clause you can draft away.
A distributor is the opposite trade. It buys your product, imports it on its own RADAR, carries the inventory and resells through its own network at its own commercial risk — absorbing credit exposure and, for consumer goods, direct liability under Brazil's Consumer Defence Code (Código de Defesa do Consumidor). There is no single distributor statute equivalent to the agency law; the relationship runs on ordinary contract under the Civil Code, which gives you more room to define terms but less statutory protection to rely on. The distributor buys you reach and takes the operational weight off your desk. What you give up is control of the resale price, the customer relationship and, often, how your brand is presented.
When the volume justifies a permanent presence, most foreign firms incorporate their own Brazilian subsidiary, typically a Limitada (Ltda) or, for larger or capital-raising ventures, a Sociedade Anônima. There is no special authorisation to form one, but there is structure to respect: foreign shareholders must obtain a Brazilian tax number — a CPF for individuals, a CNPJ for entities — and appoint an attorney-in-fact resident in Brazil, by power of attorney, empowered to receive service of process on their behalf. The company must have an administrator; since Law 14.195/2021 that person may live abroad, provided they hold a CPF and have named a resident representative. Expect the process to take typically around 30 to 60 days with foreign shareholders, most of it spent apostilling, translating and clearing bank anti-money-laundering checks rather than filing the company itself.
None of the four is the 'right' model in the abstract. An importer of record fits a first shipment; an agent or distributor fits a market you want tested by someone with local reach; a subsidiary fits a commitment you have already decided to make. The variables that decide it are your volume, your margin, how much control you need over price and brand, and how much liability you are willing to carry — and all of them are about to be re-priced by Brazil's consumption-tax reform, as CBS and IBS phase in and change the economics of every channel. If you are weighing which way into Brazil makes sense for your product, our Opportunity Scan is built to model exactly that.
Business intelligence, not legal or tax advice.