Cyprus Employment Permits to employees of companies of foreign interests (IBC)

Cyprus Employment permits to employees of companies of foreign interests (IBC)

The Council of Ministers, with its Decision of 7.10.2020, reviewed the policy regarding the issuance of temporary residence and employment permits to employees of existing and new companies of foreign interests (IBC) registered in Cyprus, as well as companies that have joined the Fast Track Business Activation Mechanism.

The main differences from the previous policy are as follows:

For new companies to be registered, an investment of €200.000 is required (previously investment was €171.000).
For new Directors, the minimum salary is now set to €4.000 and for new Key Personnel to €2.000
A new category of employees is created, called Specialists (in addition to the Directors, Key Personnel and Supporting Staff). Companies are entitled to employ third-country nationals in professions / with skills as listed in Table below:

#	Professions / Skills
1	Software and System Engineers
2	Application and Data Architects
3	Information and Communication Technology and Enterprise Solution Architects
4	Technical Assurance Professionals
5	Telecom and Space Engineers
6	Data scientists
7	Machine Learning Engineers
8	Web Developers and designers
9	UX User Experience Professionals
10	Quantitative Analysts
11	Quality Assurance Analysts
12	Mobile Application Developers
13	Augmented Reality/ Virtual Reality Programmers
14	Digital Marketing Specialists
15	Video Production Multimedia Specialists for Mobile Apps and Software
16	Analysts for Mobile Apps and Software
17	Designers of Prototype for Mobile Devices
18	DevOps Engineers
19	Cyber Security Specialists
20	Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Big Data Specialists
21	Pharmaceutical Formulation Technologists
22	Pharmaceutical Engineer Validation Specialists
23	Pharmaceutical Patents Specialists
24	Pharmaceutical Regulatory and Quality Assurance Professionals
25	Marine Engineers
26	Naval Architects

The minimum acceptable gross monthly earnings for Specialists is €2.000, an amount that can be adjusted from time to time, depending on fluctuations in the wage index.

The maximum number of third-country employees per staff category, as per new policy:

Staff Category	Maximum allowed number
Directors	5
Middle management executives and other key personnel	10
Specialists	Based on annual turnover* ≤1 million: 5 >€1 – €3 millions: 10 >€3 – €5 millions: 20 >€5 – €10 millions: 30 >€10 – €20 millions: 50 >€20 – €30 millions:100 >€30 millions: 200 * For eligible companies that relocate to Cyprus and have joined the Fast Track Business Activation Mechanism, the turnover that will be taken into account will be the one of the company’s abroad. This will be valid for the first two years of operations in Cyprus. Following the first two years, the annual turnover of the company in Cyprus will be taken into account.
Support Staff	30% of the total staff (will be reviewed by the Department of Labour during the labor market test).