San Marino Innovation — Tiered Tax Certification That Pulled In 96 Foreign Founders and 12 Locals

Since the Innovation Decree, San Marino Innovation - the state-backed institute for innovation - certifies firms as 'high-tech', granting a 12-year tax glide path: full income-tax exemption for 3 years, 4% for the next 4 years, and 8% for the following 5 years, plus an exemption from the operating-licence fee for the first two tiers.

Certified companies rose from 89 (end of 2022) to 105 (end of 2023, +18%) to 109 (end of 2024); employment rose from 215 to 272 to 309 staff over the same period. By end-2024 the mix was 73 Level-I startups, 27 Level-II, and 9 in the Scale-Up Acceleration tier.

The official figures also show real limits: in 2024, of 49 applications reviewed, 21 (43%) were rejected for failing innovation or business-plan criteria; in 2023, 14 certified companies exited the scheme (4 revoked for non-compliance, the rest voluntary withdrawals). The mix skews heavily foreign - 96 foreign entrepreneurs versus just 12 local ones in 2024 - and female entrepreneurship, while rising, stood at only 12% (up from 7% in 2021).

For a microstate of roughly 34,000 people, absolute scale stays small, but the combination of consistent, dated annual figures - corroborated by both the certifying institute and independent public-broadcaster reporting - makes this an unusually transparent, trackable version of the 'innovative startup tax regime' model many jurisdictions run more opaquely.

Read the full analysis: https://www.sanmarinoinnovation.com/comunicati-stampa/con-san-marino-innovation-sempre-pi-imprese-e-talenti