OIZ, R&D and Incentive Processes — Answers You Need

Yes. An OIZ acquires legal personality once the founding protocol — signed by the representatives of the participating institutions and by the Governor — is approved by the Ministry and entered into the registry. OIZs are private-law legal entities.

An OIZ’s bodies are: the Founding Committee (replaced by the General Assembly once the operational stage is reached), the Board of Directors, the Supervisory Board and the Zone Directorate.

The right to establish, operate, procure and distribute infrastructure facilities required by the OIZ — electricity, water, sewerage, natural gas, treatment plants and communications — belongs solely to the OIZ. Entities located within the OIZ are required to meet their infrastructure needs through the OIZ’s own facilities and may not source them elsewhere without the OIZ’s permission.

Costs of the OIZ’s infrastructure and shared services are borne by the participants, and companies cannot avoid paying management dues on the grounds that they do not use the listed services.

OSBÜK (Organized Industrial Zones Supreme Organization) was established to ensure consistency of practice across OIZs, to act before public bodies for issue resolution and to coordinate with the Ministry. Membership in OSBÜK and payment of the established dues is mandatory for all OIZs that have acquired legal personality.

Land allocation applications must be submitted via the Ministry’s online system. Available parcels are announced on the OIZ, OSBÜK and Ministry systems, and applications are scored according to weighting coefficients defined in the Ministry’s evaluation form. When demand exceeds supply, a shortlist is drawn starting from the highest-scoring applicant and investors are invited to a notarized lottery or tender for allocation.

Investors must obtain a building permit within 1 year from the allocation date and start production by obtaining a workplace opening and operating licence within 2 years from the building permit date. These periods may be extended within defined limits where reasonable grounds exist; otherwise the allocation is revoked. In addition, investors whose statutory periods have expired may be granted an extension by the Ministry until 31/3/2028, provided they apply by 31/12/2025.

Yes — participants may lease their facilities to one or more tenants for production purposes. However, leasing requires that the title deed be free of any reclaim annotation, that for parcels allocated after 05.09.2024 at least one year has passed since obtaining such an unencumbered title, and that there be no overdue debt to the OIZ.

Two or more industrial parcels may be merged. Subdivision, however, is subject to specific conditions to prevent land speculation: the resulting parcels must be at least 3,000 m², Ministry approval is required, and to prevent speculative transactions, shareholders must commit not to transfer more than 49% of the company’s shares without Ministry approval.

OIZs that stand out with resource and energy efficiency, lean production, industrial waste collaboration and environmentally responsible practices are certified as “Green OIZ” by the Turkish Standards Institution (TSE). Projects designed to meet Green OIZ criteria are given priority in the Ministry’s lending processes.

According to the Regulation, in the event of a possible disaster, a business continuity plan must be prepared in line with business continuity objectives so that the OIZ can sustain, recover or restore its value-creating activities. Preparation of the plan is the duty of the Zone Directorate, while the authority and responsibility to approve it belongs to the Founding Committee or the General Assembly.

A Business Continuity Plan (BCP) is an operational document that defines how organizations and critical infrastructures will sustain or recover their critical business activities after an interruption or crisis. Its core purpose is to minimize confusion and stress during a disruption and to provide personnel with a clear, easy-to-follow, pre-defined roadmap. These plans ensure that the organization’s essential functions are restarted and sustained within pre-targeted Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and at the Minimum Business Continuity Objective (MBCO) service levels. They also play a strategic role in strengthening organizational, social and administrative resilience by enabling the post-disaster recovery process to be managed in a planned manner.

Organizational resilience is not just about having a plan. It is a structure that must be built on good governance practices, adaptive capacity, agility, transformation capability and a risk and resilience culture spread across the entire organization. It is a holistic management approach in which different disciplines such as emergency management, business continuity, crisis management, IT disaster recovery and risk management — all sitting on this foundation — operate in an integrated manner.

An R&D Centre is a unit organized as a separate department within the structure of capital companies, exclusively conducting research and development activities domestically and possessing sufficient R&D capability and capacity. A Design Centre is similarly defined as a unit operating exclusively in design activities within Turkey.

To establish an R&D Centre, you must employ at least 15 full-time equivalent R&D personnel in a unit organized as a separate department and operating exclusively in Turkey. For Design Centres, at least 10 full-time equivalent design personnel are required. The President is authorized to lower or raise these thresholds on a sectoral basis.

100% of R&D, innovation and design expenditures incurred at the centres can be deducted from the corporate or income tax base. In addition, depending on personnel education level (for example 95% for PhD holders, 90% for master’s holders, 80% for others), an income-tax withholding incentive on the withholding tax return, social-security premium support equal to half of the employer’s share calculated on gross wages, and stamp-duty as well as customs-duty exemptions on documents issued under projects are provided.

Activities such as marketing, market research, quality control, social-science research, oil/mineral exploration, set-up costs, routine software updates and consumer testing for advertising purposes are not classified as R&D or design activities under the law.

Yes. Project activities that must necessarily be carried out off-site, plus periods spent off-site for education — up to 1.5 years for those pursuing a master’s and 2 years for those pursuing a PhD — are within the incentive scope. Furthermore, in R&D and Design Centres, the incentive coverage rates for off-site time spent by personnel (remote work, field studies, etc.) under the income-tax withholding incentive have been extended until 31/12/2026: 100% for IT personnel and 75% for other personnel.

Yes. For contracted projects, 50% of the expenditures may be deducted by the R&D / Design Centre and the remaining 50% by the contracting taxpayer.

Corporate-tax payers whose R&D deduction amount benefited from on the annual tax return is TRY 5,000,000 or more must transfer 3% of this amount (up to TRY 100,000,000 per year) to a temporary account on the liabilities side and use this fund by year-end as an investment in Venture Capital Investment Funds or in entrepreneurs. If the transfer is not made, 20% of the deducted amount is reversed and a tax penalty is imposed.

Audits review full-time-equivalent R&D / design personnel calculations, R&D eligibility of expense items, personnel PKDS records, project documentation and the technical depth of annual activity reports. Pre-audit simulations, data-driven reporting and process digitalization enable early detection and resolution of risk findings.

TDZs are sites or technoparks where companies using high or advanced technology, leveraging the resources of universities or R&D centres, produce technology, transform inventions into commercial products and thereby contribute to regional development — bringing the academic and economic structures together.

Each R&D or design project to be executed by entrepreneurs is reviewed by a “Project Evaluation Committee” designated by the managing company and consisting of expert academic staff and a sector representative. Projects whose review is completed and deemed appropriate are issued a Project Acceptance Certificate, after which space is allocated.

If entrepreneurs cannot launch a new R&D or design project within three months following the completion date of their project, the existing lease is deemed terminated regardless of the contract period and the procedures to remove the entrepreneur from the zone are initiated.

For income- and corporate-tax payers operating in a TDZ, the earnings derived exclusively from software, design and R&D activities within the zone are exempt from income and corporate tax until 31/12/2028. Software deliveries and services produced in the zone — such as system management, data management, business applications, mobile, internet and gaming — are also exempt from VAT.

Yes. For companies that hire graduates of Ministry-approved “Programs Eligible for Support” — such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, biochemistry, biotechnology, industrial design, industrial design engineering, metallurgy and materials engineering, molecular biology and genetics — the portion of the personnel’s salary equal to the gross minimum wage applicable for that year is covered by the Ministry for 2 years. In addition, an incentive equal to the gross minimum wage is provided by the Ministry for 2 years for PhD-student R&D personnel hired by TDZ companies for the first time.

Yes. Corporate-tax payers whose exempt earnings within a TDZ are TRY 5,000,000 or more must transfer 3% of this amount (up to TRY 100,000,000 per year) to a temporary account on the liabilities side and use this fund by year-end as an investment in Venture Capital Investment Funds or in entrepreneurs. If the transfer is not made, 20% of the deducted amount is reversed and a tax penalty is imposed.

Incubation centres are facilities where office space, equipment, consulting and technical support services are provided in a single point to entrepreneurs in order to develop young and new businesses. R&D, software and design companies whose establishment is at most three years old can take space allocations in incubation centres (for up to 36 months) and benefit from significant financial advantages such as rent reductions.

The process involves an introductory call, needs analysis, scope and objective definition, roadmap preparation, implementation and monitoring. Each project includes an engineering-grade work plan, measurable outputs, regular reporting and audit-readiness practices.

The introductory call is a non-binding 30–45 minute conversation in which we assess your current state, goals and potential consulting needs. You can request a meeting via the contact form or by calling +90 (506) 986 26 20.

Yes. ANT Management Consulting serves OIZs, R&D and Design Centres, Technopark managing companies and SMEs across all 81 provinces of Turkey through a hybrid (on-site + remote) delivery model.