Dutch East India Company

(VOC, or Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie) trading company chartered by the States General (parliament) of the Netherlands, and established in the northern Netherlands in 1602. It was given a monopoly on Dutch trade in the Indonesian archipelago, and certain sovereign rights such as the creation of an army and a fleet.

In the 17th century some 100 ships were regularly trading between the Netherlands and the East Indies. The company's main base was Batavia in Java (Indonesia); ships sailed there via the Cape of Good Hope, a colony founded by the company in 1652 as a staging post. During the 17th and 18th centuries the company used its monopoly of East Indian trade to pay out high dividends, but wars with England and widespread corruption led to a suspension of payments in 1781 and a takeover of the company by the Dutch government in 1798.