Yes, management can satisfy it. Develop and direct concerns control of the U.S. enterprise, through at least 50 percent ownership or operational control, rather than personal labour. The weaker version is a passive stake with decisions left to others. Show who sets direction, approves spending, and hires.
Prove control through decisions, not hours
Collect the instruments that show control: the operating agreement or shareholder register, banking authority, and the approvals the investor personally signs. Then match them to conduct — supplier terms negotiated, budgets set, staff hired. A hypothetical Chambly reader who plans to run a U.S. workshop through a foreman should be able to name the decisions reserved to the owner. If those decisions sit elsewhere, the file needs rework before filing rather than explanation afterwards.
Build a dated review file around passport evidence, ownership records, purchase documents, source-and-route evidence, business plan, and control rights. Confirm treaty nationality for both the investor and the relevant ownership of the company, substantial capital measured against the business, and funds irrevocably committed and at risk.
Assess the genuine contract terms and the enterprise’s actual or supported prospective economic capacity. E-2 classification depends on the nationality of the owners: at least 50 percent of the enterprise must be held by nationals of the treaty country whose nationality supports the case.