Saw other question ownership of government but posting in my own thread.
I didn’t see the following covered by Sim News or the rules page. Might want some of this info there before you have people wanting to change back because they didn't know.

Previous:
If I understand the current system now, the current government cannot own factories but have datacards.
This gets them to contract and interact with the other factions.

Now:
So if a faction becomes a government I know they gain the Government faction datacards but what happens to the datacards they had as a production faction (for example) and what of the factories that they already own?

I know the Empire and RA have faction specific datacards for:
capital ships
fighter ships
vehicles
other

When a faction becomes a government to they retain the datacards they had for (A) type of faction and (B) items only they built for the galaxy?
Do they gain any other ship/vehicle datacards for their becoming a government?
...or are they just a second tier government in this intergalactic struggle.

Thanks for the info.
Garv

Anyone can own any facilities. Making money/using them properly, however, is a completely different story.

Thanks Wilhelm,
Okay so I was slightly off in my reference, it is the lack of a datacard and the need of governments to arainge for factories to be build for them.

So would a production faction gone government keep those datacards?

and What of the other questions?

As I said, with the factories they'd still own them, same with facility datacards. With ship/vehicle/etc datacards, I'd assume that they keep those and have to give limited copies out to produce, just like the GE, RA, TF, Hapes, and eventually) the FF and NAO will need to do.

I don't believe they gain any ship or vehicle datacards for being a government faction.

The primary benefit of becoming a government is tax potential, as only government factions receive planetary income. You don't get any other freebies. (:

It's typically more profitable to be another type of faction, I'm sure. :P

...unless you've spent your time designing perfect tax cities/planets...

Okay I had assumed the change to government was a change from other faction type. It wasn't clear to me.

It is more like they become a production/government faction for that planet/system/sector.
Thank you both.

No, it's a turn to a government type faction. You lose the ability to produce.