The Employment and Investment Incentive Scheme (EIIS) has been funnelling up to €100m a year in to Irish businesses and in significant amounts such as Evercam who recently got €2.5m.

What is EIIS?

EIIS gives up to 40% tax relief on amounts up to €500,000 to investors in qualifying SMEs. In short if you’re a cashed up investor with big tax bills it’s attractive to invest because you can offset it against income arising in year of qualifying investment, including rental income. Then you need commit to 4 years and can make more money exiting the investment. See more on how it work and the pros and cons. Companies seeking EIIS relief must get approval from Revenue. Businesses like Dingle Distillery have encountered friction in getting their approval. Why? Some businesses are deemed ineligible; for example, businesses in professional services, finance, property development, forestry and more.

EIIS & Irish Startups

Due to the pandemic investment in startups has been lower. This is especially true for innovation driven enterprises that need significant amounts of cash before they become revenue generating. The Irish VC community has been lobbying the Irish government to expand the scheme to help startups. The SME taskforce published a growth plan for startups & scale-ups and this is being taken on board.

The Department of Finance is engaged in a public consultation process that’s moving forward from Budget 2021. There is an upcoming seminar with stakeholders and hopefully soon after we will be writing again about how startups can access EIIS. Or if you’re an SME wanting to find out if EIIS could benefit you now, we have partners who can assist. Call us today on 01 55 636 55 or email hello@businessloans.ie and we can put you in touch with our trusted EIIS partners for expert advice.