Qualified research

In accounting, qualified research means research whose costs are §174A domestic research expenditures, undertaken to discover information that is technological in nature, intended to be useful in developing a new or improved business componentResearch creditBusiness componentThe unit qualified research is tested and reported in: a product, process, computer software, technique, formula or invention held for sale, lease or license or used in the taxpayer's own business — listed one by one in Form 6765, Section G, where substantially all (80% or more) of the activities form a process of experimentationResearch creditProcess of experimentationEvaluating one or more alternatives to achieve a result whose capability, method or appropriate design is uncertain at the start, by modeling, simulation or systematic trial and error grounded in the physical or biological sciences, engineering or computer science for a functional purpose — applied to each business component separately, and excluding research after commercial production, adaptation, duplication, surveys, most internal-use softwareResearch creditInternal-use softwareSoftware developed primarily for the taxpayer's own general and administrative functions — financial management, human resources, support services. Its development qualifies for the research credit only if it also meets the high-threshold-of-innovation test: innovative, significant economic risk, and not commercially available, foreign research, social sciences and funded research.