CIR (Crédit d'Impôt Recherche)
France's research tax credit, a cornerstone of French deep tech funding: a percentage of eligible R&D spend, refundable for young and small companies.
The Crédit d’Impôt Recherche is France’s research tax credit and one of the most generous R&D incentives in Europe. It grants a credit equal to a percentage of a company’s eligible research expenditure, the headline rate is 30% on eligible R&D up to a high threshold, with a lower rate above it. The base covers research salaries, depreciation of research equipment, and certain outsourced research to approved bodies. The exact rates, base and any special treatments are set in the annual finance law and change, so a live claim should be sized against the current year’s rules. It is a cornerstone of how French deep tech, including quantum, finances its science-heavy early years.
Whether the credit is cash or a tax offset depends on the company. For SMEs, and in particular for a Jeune Entreprise Innovante or a young company, the CIR is refundable: if it exceeds the tax owed, the difference is paid out, which is what makes it true non-dilutive cash for a pre-revenue startup. For larger, profitable companies it reduces corporate tax and, if unused, is carried forward and becomes refundable after three years. The JEI status often sits alongside the CIR, adding social-charge relief on R&D staff.
Two operator realities shape the cash plan. First, timing and financing: the credit is claimed for a fiscal year and normally paid the following year, but banks and Bpifrance routinely pre-finance the receivable, advancing most of the expected credit so the company does not wait, which is why a French runway model can treat a well-documented CIR more like near-term cash than a Canadian SR&ED refund. Second, documentation and audit: the eligible R&D must meet a genuine standard of scientific or technical uncertainty and be documented to survive a tax audit, the CIR is generous but scrutinized, and an aggressive, thinly-supported claim is a liability rather than an asset.
For a French quantum company, the CIR is the equivalent of what SR&ED is in Canada, the anchor of the non-dilutive stack, and it pairs with the Jeune Entreprise Innovante status for payroll relief. Two operator facts: it can be pre-financed (banks and Bpifrance advance against the receivable, pulling the cash forward from the usual one-year lag), and the documentation bar is real, the eligible R&D must be defensible to the tax authority in a possible audit.
A French company with eligible R&D expenditure of €1,000,000 earns a CIR of 30% = €300,000. For an SME or young innovative company the credit is refundable in cash if it exceeds tax due; for larger profitable firms it offsets corporate tax and is carried forward, refundable after three years.
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