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Alessandro Binda
Alessandro Binda

Posted on • Originally published at score.get-scala.com

Free Company Data API: Why We Made 272M Business Records Searchable

Two years ago, I needed to verify whether a potential business partner's company actually existed. Simple question. Should be a simple answer.

Instead I found:

  • Government registries with no API and terrible search
  • Commercial providers charging €2–5 per lookup
  • Scraped datasets with stale, inaccurate data
  • "Free" APIs limited to a single country

So we built the S.C.A.L.A. Score API — a single endpoint to search 272 million companies across 265 countries, sourced from official government business registries.

What Data Is in the Score Database

Every record comes from an official government business registry. No LinkedIn scraping. No purchased lead lists. Just verified public records.

Data Point Coverage
Company name & legal form 272M+ records
Registration/tax ID Where available by jurisdiction
Company status (active/dissolved/liquidation) All records
Incorporation date Most jurisdictions
Registered address Most jurisdictions
Officers & directors Major jurisdictions (UK, DE, FR, IT, etc.)
Filing history Where published by registry
Industry codes (NACE/SIC) Where available

Country Coverage Highlights

  • Europe: All EU27 + UK, Norway, Switzerland, Iceland
  • North America: US (all 50 states), Canada
  • Latin America: Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile
  • Asia-Pacific: India, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan
  • Africa: South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt
  • 265 countries total

How the API Works

Search by Company Name

curl -s "https://score.get-scala.com/api/v1/search?q=BMW&country=DE" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
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Response:

{
  "total": 23,
  "companies": [
    {
      "name": "Bayerische Motoren Werke Aktiengesellschaft",
      "country": "DE",
      "registry_id": "HRB 42243",
      "status": "active",
      "incorporation_date": "1917-03-07",
      "address": "Petuelring 130, 80809 München"
    }
  ]
}
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Get Company Details

curl -s "https://score.get-scala.com/api/v1/company/DE-HRB42243" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
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Search by Registration ID

curl -s "https://score.get-scala.com/api/v1/search?registry_id=HRB42243&country=DE" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
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Why It's Free (to Start)

The free tier gives you 50 lookups per month. That's enough to:

  • Evaluate data quality for your country/industry
  • Build a proof of concept
  • Run a small verification workflow

No credit card required. No trial that auto-converts. Just 50 free API calls every month, forever.

If you need more:

Plan Lookups Price Per lookup
Free 50/mo €0 Free
Starter 500/mo €19/mo €0.038
Growth 5,000/mo €49/mo €0.0098
Scale 50,000/mo €149/mo €0.00298

Use Cases We See

KYC / AML Compliance

Verify company existence and status before onboarding a business customer. Check officers against your watchlists.

CRM Enrichment

Your sales team enters "Acme Corp" — Score API fills in the registration number, address, status, and incorporation date automatically.

Market Research

How many active logistics companies are registered in Germany? Which ones were incorporated in the last 2 years? Score API makes these queries trivial.

Due Diligence

Before a partnership, investment, or acquisition — verify the entity is real, active, and where they say they are.

Developer Tools

Building a company autocomplete? A business directory? A compliance platform? Score API is the data layer.

Open Source SDK

The JavaScript SDK is fully open source:

npm install scala-score
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GitHub: github.com/Alessandro114/scala-score-js

We also have community integrations:

  • n8n node: npm install n8n-nodes-scala
  • MCP server: npx scala-mcp-server

Start Building

Sign up free at score.get-scala.com — API key in seconds, 50 lookups/month, no credit card.

API Docs | GitHub | Status Page

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