It was originally created by the UK government in order to facilitate trade and business relations between the United Kingdom and ASEAN.

The UKABC raises awareness of the commercial opportunities in ASEAN, and provides facilitated networking opportunities with senior ASEAN commercial and political decision makers to encourage discussion and negotiation with the aim of furthering multi-national trade.

[2] They also provide structured business-to-business meetings, often with senior political and commercial decision makers.[who?]

UKABC was created out of UK Trade & Investment's strategy "Britain Open for Business", was launched by Dr Vince Cable in November 2011.

As of January 2016, The UK-ASEAN Business Council had partnerships with the Department for International Trade, Benoy, HSBC, Jardines, NashTech, Pearson, Prudential, PwC, and Shell.