Tiga bid to bolster R&D tax

UK games industry association Tiga has today published a new report which argues for changes to the R&D tax credits system, in a bid to make the initiative more helpful for British games studios.

Changes to the R&D tax credit system could bring “60 to 75 per cent” more value to games studios, Tiga said.

Currently, research and development tax credits are only available for studios working on ‘pioneering work’, such as building a new game engine.

Tiga believes, however, that the scope of R&D tax credits is broad enough to argue that game software development could qualify for the tax reduction.

“This would enable studios to invest more in R&D, generate and retain new IP, and hire more development staff,” Tiga concluded.

Tiga added that the current level of savings for R&D tax credits should be increased, from 175 per cent of qualifying expenditure “to at least 200 per cent”.

“This would mean that for every pound that an SME spends of qualifying expenditure it would get two pounds of tax deduction which it would use to reduce its corporation tax,” the association added.

Develop has not been handed the report in full.

Tiga CEO Richard Wilson said his new report “highlights how the R&D tax credits system can be reformed to power a high technology recovery”.