In our latest Sponsor Profile, we chat to Joe Routlege, innovation specialist at one of this year’s silver sponsors, Lumo Tax, which works with companies to recover tax relief against R&D claims.

Tell us more about Lumo Tax.

We’ve successfully helped over 200 companies make more than 250 R&D tax claims, recovering over £15m in tax relief over the past 10 years. And we’re proud of that. Our mission is to support innovation in the UK. So, the more companies we can help make successful R&D tax claims, the more we believe we’re doing our part.

What services does Lumo offer customers?

At Lumo we specialise in ensuring that our clients can maximise their savings in R&D Tax Credits, Patent Box and Capital Allowance. We ensure  this is completed by completing a holistic review of all areas of a client’s business to ensure that all tax saving opportunities are identified and claimed.

Do you work within particular sectors?

Our clients come from all the sectors that you would expect (Engineering, Manufacturing, IT, Software and Technology), and some that would surprise you (Architecture, Food and Drink, Transport and Professional Services).

Contrary to popular opinion, you don’t need to be wearing a lab coat at work to claim R&D tax credits.

You are a silver sponsor of this year’s EMCON – what appealed to you about the event?

I have attended and exhibited over the last few years and I find that EMCON unlike other Expo’s are able to attract the key decision makers that we want to speak to in the Manufacturing Industry.

The Manufacturing Industry has historically under claimed when it comes to Research and Development Tax Credits. The reason for this is work involving the “Continous Improvement” of manufacturing lines is identified as standard day to day work to improve a company’s profitability. If we can identify that new innovative solutions have been brought in to improve this work then this can also be included in the company’s R&D Tax Credit claim. In fact this piece of work is often the largest part of the claim due to the number of staff involved in these projects.

With this in mind it was a no brainer to attend and sponsor this year’s EMCON event to help get our message out to the key decision makers in the North East Manufacturing Industry

What do you hope to get from the event?

To build our network of connections in the North East Manufacturing sector and also find out about what other companies are working on. In addition identify new clients that will benefit from our services.