S.L. 123.194 Art. 2Interpretation. Cap. 463.

(1) In these rules, unless the context otherwise requires:

"beneficiary" means the person entitled to claim the deduction referred to in article 14(1)(p) of the Act;

"Corporation" means Malta Enterprise as established in terms of the Malta Enterprise Act;

"Patent Box Regime deduction" means the deduction referred to in article 14(1)(p) of the Act;

"qualifying IP" means:

(a) a patent or patents, whether issued or applied for, or where the issue of the patent is still pending and extensions of patent protection, so however that in the case of a patent which has been applied for and is pending, but where the application is eventually rejected, such patent shall cease to constitute qualifying IP ab initio; or

(b) (i) assets in respect of which protection rights are granted in terms of national, European or international legislation, including those relating to plants and genetic material and plant or crop protection products and orphan drug designations; or

(ii) utility models; or

(iii) software protected by copyright under national or international legislation;

(c) in respect of a small entity, other intellectual property assets as are non-obvious, useful, novel and having features similar to those of patents, to the satisfaction of the Corporation, which shall determine this through a transparent certification process in terms of guidelines issued by the Corporation:

Provided that marketing-related intellectual property assets including brands, trademarks and trade-names shall not constitute qualifying IP;

"small entity" means a beneficiary which -

(a) has a total turnover on a group basis amounting to not more than fifty million euro (€50,000,000), or equivalent; and

(b) does not itself earn more than seven million and five hundred thousand euro (€,500,000) or equivalent in gross revenue from all its intellectual property assets, which thresholds shall be calculated in respect of each beneficiary on the basis of the applicable figures over an average five year period.