KH, I suppose you're a Chinese but forgive me to assume that.

If so, you'd need a couple million yuan to kickstart your EF center as, to my knowledge, that's been most of the time the inititial fee before the grand opening day. Then, you'd have to deal with the headless offices in Shanghai and over seas where they cook and burn their plans for their EF operations. Relying on their recruiting system will also cost you somewhere in between 2,000-5,000 yuan per teacher or a DoS. Once, I was an EF DoS myself. As your EF center'll run, or run into difficulties, you'll be obligated to pay royalty fees per student at..i believe 8 %. You'll sure be able to cheat as many do and provide lower numbers to the, again, headless offices. However, you should know that EFs have a bad rap with foreign teachers especially as the working environment in many of the franchised centers is rather poor and unpro, so most likely you'll be able to hire only some high school dropouts from English speaking or none English speaking countries and mind you, you'll have to work heard to keep your team together. As for the Linguaphone, I would touch it, if I were either a Chinese of a foreigner. This franchise's getting a bad rap due to the mentioned closures of centers and that'll sure reflect on your sales, or shall i say student recruitement.

If you're not a Chinese national, then as a foreigner you'd need a local to help you with the licensing and some other issues. Chinese government controls its education if it's public or private. Foreigners aren't welcome to place their values on the peoples childrens' minds. Recent local regulations call for the Chinese principal as well as the Academic Manager/Director and both of these positions have to have at least 5 years of experience (proven and local). However, many schools/centers cheat and fill in their license applications fictitious individuals that never work or will work with them. That's China and its law/regulations enforcements. In the case that you are a foreigner, I would NOT open a school, unless it's a soccer school. As I have said the local gov officials are keen on what/who is around them and if you are "white", you'll be the center of attention.

I hope I have helped with my suggestions and maybe saved you a trouble or a financial loss.

Cheers and beers to the 5,000 or so years old country that hasn't changed much except that it's color is different :)