The decision to examine the English factory in Persia, instead of say Agra or Broach in India, is somewhat due to the factory’s physical isolation from the Surat presidency establishing it as a relatively unique position. Two English presidencies dominated the first half of the seventeenth century: Bantam and Surat. A president with his councilors, which typically consisted of four or five underfactors, oversaw English trade in the region. The English president acted as an extension or voice of the ruling body of merchants in London. The Surat presidency oversaw factories in northern India and Safavīd Persia, while the Coromandel Coast (eastern coast of India) fell under the authority of the Bantam presidency.