The financial staff presented the innovation and merger incentives bill during the cabinet meeting.
Following the disbursement of the 4th payment request for the 1-billion-euro subsidies in October, Greece will have received more than 50% of the resources allocated from the Recovery and Resilience Facility, while the submission of the 5th payment request of 1.3 billion euros will be underway.
The tax measures were also presented
In detail:
A. The R&D tax incentives included in this bill are added on the existing 200% flat-rate tax incentive for scientific and technological research expenditures. With the interventions introduced, discounts can reach from 250% to 315% in the following cases:
- Collaboration projects with startups
- Collaboration projects with research centers
- “Knowledge-intensive” SMEs, i.e. with R&D expenditure > 20% of total expenditure
Among other things, the aim is to strengthen the connection between the market and the academic community, but also to cultivate partnerships between larger companies and the country’s startup ecosystem.
B. At the same time, the framework of incentives for the commercial exploitation of patents is expanded, with the aim of making it more attractive to take the risk of investing in research and development. In particular, until today, a three-year tax exemption is provided for the relevant profits, starting from the fiscal year in which these profits were recorded for the first time.
With the interventions introduced, a reduction of the corresponding rate by 10% is foreseen for the next seven years.
C. The tax incentives for angelinvestors are expanded, with an increase in the upper limit of the investment in startups on which the deduction from the taxable income is calculated.
In addition, the possibility of utilizing this incentive for investments in mutual funds of business participations is extended.
D. The tax regime of venture capital funds is rationalized and harmonized with European practices – but also with the way other mutual fund schemes operate – so that there is an incentive to create investment schemes based entirely in Greece.
In addition, incentives were presented for business transformations.
