Operational control through other genuine means may support development and direction, but a minority shareholding or senior title alone does not establish it. The enterprise must also meet the treaty-nationality requirements.
Examine enforceable authority
Read the full governance arrangement to identify who makes important decisions, appoints management and can remove the investor. The analysis is specific to those rights and the real business role. Do not treat every management contract as sufficient or assume a published ownership percentage answers the whole case.
Resolve uncertain control before relying on the investment as an E-2 strategy. Produce a clause-by-clause note rather than a conclusion. Hypothetical example: an investor holds a minority interest in a lodging operation and points to a management agreement as proof of control.
The note should record what that agreement actually permits, what the operating agreement reserves to other holders, and how the investor may be removed. Read together, those provisions either support operational control by other genuine means or they do not, and the answer is specific to the documents rather than to the size of the holding or the seniority of the title. Where provisions conflict, identify which instrument governs and obtain advice on the effect.
The analysis remains individual: no proportion is identified as sufficient here, and the enterprise must separately satisfy the treaty-nationality requirement, which is evidenced through the nationality of its owners rather than through the investor management role.