Macedonianpublic limited liabilitylimited liability

What is “AD”?

AD stands for Акционерско друштво (Macedonian), a public limited liability company used primarily in Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Serbia. The suffix signals that the business has limited liability and is eligible for public listing.

Full meaning & translation

The full form is Акционерско друштво, a Macedonian-language term. It translates literally as “Joint-stock company.” You may also encounter it abbreviated or written as akcionarsko društvo, aktsionerno drujestvo, а.д., ад.

Where it's used

AD appears in company names registered in the following 3 jurisdictions:

BG · BulgariaMK · North MacedoniaRS · Serbia

What it tells you about the company

LiabilityOwners' liability is limited to their capital contribution. Personal assets are protected.
OwnershipMay issue publicly traded shares listed on a stock exchange.
ComparableBroadly equivalent to Corp in United States, AG in Germany, SA in France.

Equivalent forms around the world

These are the closest structural equivalents to AD in other jurisdictions — same entity category, different national law.

CountryEquivalent suffix
United StatesCorp
GermanyAG
FranceSA
BulgariaADS
FranceAE
GermanyAGKGA
GermanyAKGKA
GermanyCOAG
BulgariaEAD
GermanyINVAG
North MacedoniaJTD
GermanyKGA
United KingdomPLC
GermanyREITAG
GermanySE
GermanySE*
FranceSEM
FranceSICAF
FranceSICAV
FranceSPA
United KingdomULTD
BulgariaZAD
BulgariaZEAD
BulgariaZPAD

Normalizing “AD” in your data

When matching or deduplicating company records, the legal suffix is noise — Acme AD” and “Acme” should resolve to the same entity. One API call strips it and returns a stable canonical form:

Request
curl -X POST https://api.ambect.com/v1/normalize/company \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $AMBECT_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"name": "Acme AD", "country": "bg"}'
Response
{
  "data": {
    "canonical": "acme ad",
    "legal_type": null,
    "tokens": [
      "acme",
      "ad"
    ]
  },
  "meta": {
    "pipeline": [
      "lowercase",
      "legal_suffix"
    ],
    "confidence": 0.99
  }
}

Frequently asked questions

What does AD stand for?

AD stands for Акционерско друштво (Macedonian), which translates as "Joint-stock company".

Is a AD public or private?

A AD is a public entity — it can issue shares that are listed and traded on a stock exchange.

What is the liability in a AD?

Owners of a AD have limited liability. Their personal assets are protected, and their exposure is capped at the amount they invested.

Which countries use AD?

AD is used in Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Serbia.

Need to normalize AD at scale? The Ambect API handles it across 100+ countries in under 5 ms.

Try the live normalizer free →