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RESEARCHING BUSINESSES
IN MÉXICO


This Subject Guide is designed for those doing research on small and medium businesses and their related industries in Mexico. Researching large and publicly owned Mexican companies follows the same guidelines as large or publicly owned companies in the United States. To follow that style of research, use the Company & Industry Research Subject Guide.

Business Research in Mexico requires a slightly different approach to the search process because there are fewer newspaper and magazine stories about specific companies. The smaller the company, the harder it is to find information. The 3 main areas of research needed most often are Company, Industry, and Markets. More detailed explanations are given at the links below:


Other general business sources that can be helpful:
    1. Guides to Business Reference Sources
    2. Business And Marketing Plans
        The process and information needed for a business or marketing plan are about the same between the two countries, but the formal documents are different. These U.S. business plan items can only be used as general guides to what should be in a businesss plan for Mexico.


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Mexican Company Analysis

The first thing about researching a company is deteriming the information you do have and what you need to verify. When doing research on companies, it is important to remember to search more than the just the company name. This is particularly important for searching through indexes and web sites for news and articles:

What to look for
(the words you search for)

    ==> Company name (omit the words: Co, Corp, Inc, Ltd, SA, SRL, etc)
        Company Subsidiaries and Divisions names,
        Company Parent names
        Ultimate Parent Company names, &
        ticker symbols, if available
    ==> Competitors (#1 company in the industry & other close competitors) names & ticker symbols
    ==> Look for interviews with the top officers in the company & parent company. The smaller the company, the more likely that the owner and family members hold all of these positions, if such positions exist. The owner is often both the CEO and the President of the company.
        CEO (Chief Executive Officer), or Director (Gerente) General
        COO (Chief Operations Officer), or Director (Gerente) de Producción (Planta)
        CFO (Chief Financial Officer), or Director (Gerente) Financiero (de Finanzas)
        President or Presidente, and
        Chairman of the Board
    ==> Any mention by brand name, especially look for advertisements and coupons, sponsorship of charity events/programs or sporting events.
      Brand and product names show up the least, but are often very valuable in finding information.

Directories, one of the best starting points for company information, usually give the basic information of name, address, telephone and fax numbers, e-mail, web site, officer(s), sales, and type of business or industrial classifications. There are 3 types of directories -- Company Directories, Industry Directories, and Government Agencies records. In addition to Directories, there are 2 other types of information sources that must also be used: Public Records kept by state and local governments, which can be more than just the directory type of information, and Local News sources.

1.    Directories

    While you are using the directories, don't overlook the data mining of the competition and the industry you are often able to do with directories, especially those that are available online. Click on the following link to find an example of the way to datamine using the step by step instructions for Data Mining Reference USA.

    If no company website is given in any of the directories, use an Internet Search Engine like Yahoo! Mexico (http://mx.yahoo.com), Google (http://www.google.com) or Yahoo! (http://www.yahoo.com) to try to find the company web site. If there is a possibility of the company name being used in another country, be sure to include the term "Mexico" in the search strategy.

    Commercially published directories similar to the ones published by the U.S. publishers: Dun & Bradstreet, Mergent, and Standard & Poor's are listed below.    IBCON and Mercamétrica, two of the major Mexican publishers of directories, have web sites that are in both Spanish and English.

    Only recently have businesses with fewer than 500 employees (small & medium sized) been consistently included in directories. Since ASU does not purchase all of these directories and they are more widely available in Mexico, the links provided are to the publisher's web sites with descriptions of the directories. Sample pages links are provided if they are available.

The next step is to check the public records of the state and local government agencies for company information:

2.    Mexico State and Local Government information on companies

    Government data of special interest are the public records kept by the government: deeds, leins, trustee sales, civil & criminal court cases, health inspection ratings, licenses, incorporations, nonprofit organizations registered, telemarketers registered, building permits, zoning, toxic clean-up sites, economic reports, industry reports, etc.

    Cities and municipios are in various stages of placing their information on the web.  In many cases, you will have to visit "city hall" and the "county courthouse" (offices) to actually get the information. Most municipio offices are in the cabecera (county seat), but some municipios have satellite offices in other locales.

    There are specific types of public information that tell what a small business is, what it owns, what it owes, what it is owed, etc.

    The following web pages will help locate public agencies and public records that provide this type of information.

Once you have some directory information and any company information from state agencies, you start looking for articles on the company and each of the top officers and owners you were able to find. Also check out any companies that appear to own your company or be owned by your company. Follow up on any web pages found in any articles. Keep track of all the threads of information you find so you can follow up later.

3.    Mexico News Sources:

    A. Mexico Major & Other Newspaper web sites and News Agencies (Periodicos, Noticias y Agencias de Noticias)
    • Do search the newspapers' sites directly from the hot link above and then use the indexed and full text access for the older articles from other providers:
    • A useful section of the newspaper is the Society Page. Society Page information can be quite useful for tidbits of information about the company or its owners and their favorite causes, charities, and other social events.
    • The sports section can provide information on any corporate sponsorships. Small comapnies are more likely to sponsor local events or teams, so the small local newspapers are also important.
      You can continue tracking these news items and glean additional information by going back to the public information held by the various levels of government to follow up on these leads.

Just because you do NOT find information, doesn't mean the company you are researching is automatically a fraud, illegal (black market, underground economy) or non-existent. The new technologies make it much easier to start a company from anywhere without all the usual evidence. Once you have reached this point, however, the research gets even more difficult and time consuming. It does happen that people form companies, register trademarks, internet addresses, etc. and never do anything more. Smaller Businesses also have a high failure rate. If you wish to continue doing research, consult your local business reference librarian.

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City and Local Markets Information Sources

When researching Mexican Businesses and Industries, people are often interested in the information about the local market: demographics, quality of life, neighborhoods, shopping, schools, etc. These items are critical if you are planning to locate in a particular area or sell your product or service. This information can also help you decide why a company or industry is located where it is or who the target market is.

If you are unfamiliar with an area, you can use a directory of Municipios (counties) or Localidades (cities & towns) in Mexico:

Best sources for

  1. General Information about a Place are
  2. Development Information
    • Minutes of local boards, commisions, and councils
    • State SEDECO: Secretaría de Desarrollo Económico (Ministry of Economic Development) web sites
    • State ALC: Areas de Libre Comercio (Free Trade Zones)
    • Municipio Desarrollo Económico web sites (Ecnonomic Development)

  3. Statistics
  4. Marketing Data

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