A frequently overlooked source of SR&ED credits
Claims filed since 2008
Refunds secured for Canadian innovators
Success rate on filed claims
Companies working in materials science, metallurgy and precision manufacturing often conduct significant SR&ED-eligible R&D, but they do not always recognize it as such.
If your team is developing new alloys, optimizing refining processes, improving the properties of precious metals, or engineering materials to meet specifications that no existing solution satisfies, that work is worth examining closely.
The question CRA asks is whether your team faced technical uncertainty that could not be resolved with existing knowledge, and whether you addressed it through systematic investigation. In materials engineering, that bar is often met without the company realizing it.
Important distinction: Routine quality control, routine testing, standard manufacturing process adjustments and replication of existing techniques do not qualify. We will help you identify precisely where the line falls in your specific operations, clearly and without ambiguity.
The Ring of Fire in northern Ontario is a large deposit of chromite, nickel, copper and other critical minerals that both the provincial and federal governments have identified as a strategic priority. The companies developing the extraction, processing and refining technologies for these materials are doing exactly the kind of work SR&ED was designed to support.
Companies working in this space are developing new hydrometallurgical processes, novel smelting approaches and materials engineering solutions to handle ore compositions that do not behave like conventional deposits. That technical uncertainty, and the systematic experimentation required to resolve it, is the core of an SR&ED claim.
The Income Tax Act excludes prospecting, exploring or drilling for, or producing, minerals from SR&ED, as well as commercial production. Eligible work lies in developing new or improved extraction, processing and refining methods, not in operating them.
Critical minerals processing and refining for battery supply chains, including nickel, cobalt, lithium and rare earth elements, all with active provincial and federal government support programs.
Process development, materials characterization, hydrometallurgy R&D and the engineering of downstream refining operations all generate SR&ED-eligible work, often alongside IRAP and provincial incentive programs.
Note on stacking incentives: SR&ED can often be claimed alongside federal and provincial grants for critical minerals projects; however, government grants and other assistance reduce the expenditures eligible for SR&ED, so the overlap must be calculated carefully. InGenuity will map your funding picture before any claim is filed.
Managing Director
Co-founder (Ret.); former CRA Senior Science Advisor and Research and Technology Advisor
Elizabeth has prepared claims across mining, drilling and materials R&D since 2008. Gil served at CRA as a Senior Science Advisor and Research and Technology Advisor and helped draft SR&ED policy, so InGenuity knows where CRA draws the line between process development and routine production.
Choosing an SR&ED consultant is a significant decision: you are trusting someone to represent your company’s work to the CRA accurately, defensibly and without overpromising.
We work transparently alongside your team. If you have an in-house R&D manager, we actively support their growth rather than creating dependency on external consultants.
We tell you what qualifies and what does not, clearly and upfront. We do not inflate claims or make guarantees; our goal is a defensible, accurate submission you can stand behind.
We were looking for expertise and training support for our team to write the technical narratives required as part of the Scientific Research & Experimental Development (SR&ED) Program, and commissioned Elizabeth Lance of Ingenuity Group Solutions for this mandate. We were extremely impressed with Elizabeth’s extensive knowledge of the program and her ability to quickly understand our requirements and efficiently and professionally deliver exactly to our needs. Elizabeth is a superior communicator, and we would highly recommend Elizabeth and InGenuity Group to anyone going through the difficult SR&ED process.
Michael Groves, VP of R&D, Royal Canadian Mint
Our resource site covers where CRA draws the line between routine engineering and SR&ED, and how materials costs are treated. Three articles worth reading before your next claim:
No sales process, no pressure. Just a conversation with our SR&ED expert, Elizabeth. We work on an hourly, fixed-fee or contingency basis, and contingency engagements include CRA review and audit support at no extra cost.
