Last Wednesday, November 23rd, President of Poland Andrzej Duda signed the Innovation Act which introduces incentives for innovative businesses and researchers and encourages the commercialisation of research findings. The legislation deals with many of the issues that have bothered the entrepreneurs and is a milestone in making Poland a more innovation-friendly environment.

The new law offers support for businesses, young scientists and research facilities that are involved in technological innovation. President Duda hopes that the commercialised innovations “will be able to work in the Polish economy as well as globally and will, thus, expand Polish entrepreneurship on foreign markets.” The President notes that raising Polish innovation level will also push the national economy forward and influence Polish research positively.

“I’d like young people to gain faith in development openings in our country, so that they don’t have to go abroad to pursue their life goals”, Duda said.

Poland might still not be as innovative as it could be but the government is actively trying to change that. The Innovation Act marks the beginning of changes, as the Ministry of Science and Higher Education are still working on the big Innovation Act that should come into force in 2018.

The Minister of Science and Higher Education, Jaroslaw Gowin, admits that the innovation level in the Polish economy has been low due to most new solutions being based on foreign models.

“We want to change this. We want Polish economy to be truly innovative. In the long run it can be achieved only in one way: by bridging the gap between business and Polish science”, Gowin said.

The new regulations abolish for good income tax on contributed intellectual property, enable tax deductions on patent costs for SMEs and extend the deduction period for R&D costs from three to six years. Research facilities will be obliged to invest in commercialisation of the ongoing research projects. What’s more, they’re losing the so called “enfranchisement of scientists” which was meant to provide scientists with bigger shares in financial rewards but, in reality, shifted too much paperwork to the research facilities while the researchers themselves were mostly uninterested in the enfranchisement. In turn, the new legislation allows the researchers to choose whatever arrangement suits them best. Those are just some of the key changes to the current law.

Innovation Act comes into force 30 days from the signing, save for the tax changes, which come into force on January 1, 2017.