Getting R&D Ready to Boost Your Cash Flow

Getting R&D Tax ready to boost your cash flow! tti r t st your cash flow! ti t t you c fl !

16 June 2020

16 June 2020

Agenda

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

R&D Tax Incentive Status

R&D Tax Planning and IP Management

Update on Key Lodgement Dates

Grant Funding

Q&A

1

R&D Tax Incentive status

Proposed Changes Status update

“Theobjective…is to encourage industry to conduct research and development activities thatmight otherwise not be conducted because of an uncertain return from the activities…”

Current Status

- Government re-introduced a slightly modified Treasury Laws Amendment (Research and Development Tax Incentive) Bill 2019 into Parliament in December 2019.

- Senate has referred the Bill to the Senate Standing Committee for further inquiry and the reporting date has been extended until 7 August 2020.

- It is unlikely the proposed changes will be enacted in the short term.

2

R&D Tax Planning & IP management

R&D Tax Incentive R&D Activities

Core R&D Activities

Supporting R&D Activities

R&D Tax Project

Intellectual Property IP can take many different forms

Concepts

Documents

Software

Know-how

Data

Control Strategies

Inventions

Processes

Drawings

Reports

Confidential Information

Trade Names

Pictures

Results

Ideas

Process for Claiming the R&D Tax Incentive Steps in the process

IP Management Activities: Identify, Capture, Evaluate, Protect

R&D Readiness Record-keeping

To demonstrate:

The following records maybe suitable:

R&D activities were undertaken ‘for’ the R&D entity The registered R&D activities took place The registered activities satisfied the definition of ‘core’ or ‘supporting’ R&D activities

Contract(s) between entities concerning the R&D activities and amounts that will be paid, invoices (narrations are important), email traffic and other records of communication Photos, videos, plans, progress reports, meeting notes, test results and physical evidence (e.g. scrapped prototypes)

There must be evidence for all criteria.

Correspondencewith or reports from experts in the field (can include the R&D entity’s personnel), IP search reports*, literature reviews, scholarly articles, plans, progress reports, meeting notes and test results Contract(s) between entities concerning the R&D activities and amounts that will be paid, invoices (narrations are important), banking records, tax returns and records (of entities paid by the R&D entity), payroll records and financial statements Contract(s) between entities concerning the R&D activities and amounts that will be paid, invoices (narrations are important), email traffic and other records of communication, physical evidence, employee timesheets

R&D expenditure was incurred by the R&D entity

R&D expenditure was incurred on registered R&D activities

IP Management Best practices

Make use of free & defensive measures

1

6

Identify & capture IP

Evaluate & protect IP assets

Nominate one or more ‘IP Champions’

2

7

Manage IP ownership & access issues

3

Respect 3 rd party IP rights

8

Understand & monitor the ‘IP Landscape’

4

Enforce rights when required

9

Consider IP more regularly in business activities

5

10

Be proactive!

3

Key dates & timeframes

Key Dates and Timeframes Lodgement and Filing

R&D Activity Registration extension deadline for FYE 30 June 2019

R&D Activity Registration deadline for FYE 30 June 2020

IP Timeframes

30 September 2020

30 April 2021

30 June 2021

30 June 2020

Additional information deadline for FYE 30 June 2020 Advance/Overseas Findings

Application deadline for FYE 30 June 2021 Advance/Overseas Findings

Provisional Application deadline for FYE 30 June 2020 Advance/Overseas Findings

4

Grant Funding

Grant Funding

AcceleratingCommercialisation

CRC-P

- Commonwealth program to support commercialisation of novel products, processes or services. Grants up to $1 million on a 50:50 co-funding basis. - The novel product, process or service the applicant is seeking to commercialisemust be for trade to customers outside of the state or territory of the applicant’s business. - Process starts with lodging an EOI – then there are 3 key streams of activity: CommercialisationGuidance, Accelerating CommercialisationGrant and Portfolio Services.

- Commonwealth program to support commercialisation research. Grants up to $3 million on a 50:50 co-funding basis.

- Consortia need to contain at least:

- One Small to MediumEnterprise (less than 200 employees)

- One publicly funded research institution (e.g. University, CSIRO)

- One other industry participant

- Typical projects involve scaling-up and proving-out a technology with a core concept that has already been proven (i.e. can’t be an R&D project).

5

Q&A

Who to contact

Thank you

www.pwc.com.au

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