We knew them at the head of the Archewell Foundation, the charity through which the Duke and Duchess of Sussex support initiatives and charities, just as we knew Archewell Production, a branch of their company which is used to produce entertainment content for commercial purposes. The British press discovered no less than 11 companies with opaque operations, registered in Delaware, the American state considered to be the tax haven for companies. Certain codenames of the 11 companies were chosen in relation to winks in the life of Prince Harry and his wife.
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The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have created several companies to manage their activities and protect their anonymity
More than one million companies are registered in Delaware, an American state on the east coast with a population of only 990,000. According to the business department of Delaware, half of the companies listed on the US stock exchange are registered in Delaware and 66% of the country’s 500 largest companies are also located there. Delaware does not tax any income earned outside the state.
The tabloid Daily Mail got his hands on a set of incorporation documents of companies registered in Delaware and at the head of which the Duke and Duchess of Sussex would find themselves. Eleven companies were created in their name, in a very short time. Of the eleven companies, ten would be registered in Delaware, but each time the headquarters would be in the office of their Californian lawyer, Richard Genow, in Beverly Hills. The latter company, UpCounsel, is also registered in Delaware but is headquartered at the same address as the British Consulate General in Los Angeles, not at their lawyer’s office.
In September 2020, the couple, through their lawyer, Richard Genow, and their accountant, Andrew Meyer, founded the company Peca Publishing. “Peca” means “freckles” in Spanish. The name is said to refer to the very first essay written by Meghan Markle when she was little, and which was titled “A Face Without Freckles… Is a Night Without Stars”. in French). Peca Publishing is set to raise money from the sale of the children’s book The Bench, published by the Duchess of Sussex last year.
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Orinoco Publishing was founded on December 22, 2021. According to Daily Mail, this company should be used to hold the rights and collect the income generated by the sale of the memoirs of the Duke of Sussex, which are due to be published this year, at Penguin Random House. Orinoco is the Spanish name for the Orinoco, a South American river that crosses Venezuela and Colombia.
The Cobbelstone Lane business was established in February 2020 and was apparently founded to register the Archewell brand name. Several companies may have been created simply to act discreetly during certain public proceedings. For example, an application for registration of a brand name is a public procedure. In order not to reveal the project, Harry and Meghan applied to register the name Archewell in the name of their new company and not in their own name.
The company IPHW (perhaps the diminutive of Intellectual Property Harry of Wales or Windsor?) was also created with the aim of registering a logo. This time it’s an intertwined A and W, like Archewell. Archewell Audio and Archewell Productions were registered to handle production deals with Spotify and Netflix.
Baobab Holdings is another company registered in Delaware, which would be used to make investments. The Bridgemont company, in the name of the Sussexes, also has a corporate name linked to entertainment. We do not know the precise reason for the founding of the Hampshire company in January 2021. The name Hampshire recalls the getaway of Prince Harry and his wife in Hampshire a few weeks before the birth of Meghan Markle in 2019.
Nemawashi Holdings, founded in September 2021, aims to serve as a holding company for other companies. Nemawashi is a Japanese term for laying the foundations of a project. Finally, in August 2020 already, a company, RPV Holdings, had been registered. Again, its usefulness is not known. In the past, another company of Meghan Markle had already been registered in Delaware. In the past, before meeting Prince Harry, the actress was also an influencer and published on her blog The Tig. She then created the company Frim Fram Inc to manage the income generated by her online activities. On December 30, 2019, this company had merged to be registered as an entity in Delaware.
Remember that the incorporation of these companies is completely legal and it is even the common way of managing one’s affairs in the United States, when one wishes to benefit from both tax relief and a certain anonymity. In addition, Prince Harry has already indicated that the profits from the sales of his memoirs will be redistributed, in part to his Sentebale association, as will the profits from the sales of The Bench, the children’s book written by his wife.
