I was wondering how much it costs to open a company in the UK to do something like that, and it seems to be really cheap (and quick):

a) Incorporate directly via Companies House

The standard registration fee to set up a company is just £12 for the ‘standard’ Companies House web incorporation service, which takes up to 24 hours to turnaround. You can pay via credit card, debit card or PayPal.

Source: https://www.itcontracting.com/how-much-limited-company-cost/

Yes, it is. Do they still require a minimum of two officers?

(Spam warning: if you form a company at your home address, you will be inundated with paper spam for office equipment. Especially from Dell.)

I have a ltd company registered at home and I got sent a pen with the company name engraved on it - nice spam :)

I also had a letter telling me I was the beneficiary of a few million dollars which was less useful :)

No. You can do it with one person.

It is easy to set up a company in the UK and quite rightly so. If it wasn't then the economy might suffer.

Issues such as what that company does after incorporation are another matter.

Not many DBMS which support stacked queries I'll guess.