This new order brings two important amendments comparing to the previous one:

• The employees of the companies whose object of activity includes creation of software, benefit by tax exemption on the salary incomes and on those assimilated to salaries, if certain cumulative conditions are fulfilled.  Among such cumulative conditions it has been re-introduced the limitative condition related to the ceiling of EUR 10,000 of annual income that the employer must realize for each employee who benefits by the income tax exemption (such condition existed in a previous order applicable in 2015). Such annual income must be realized by employer in the previous fiscal year following the creation of software, and must be registered distinctively into its analytical balance sheets. The above condition does not apply to new companies in the first two fiscal years.  

The tax exemption is applied monthly to the salary incomes and to those assimilated to salaries, irrespective of the hiring date of the relevant employee and without being conditioned by the contribution of such employee to the achievement of the minimum ceiling of EUR 10,000 mentioned above. 

The above ceiling will affect the companies that did not achieve in the previous fiscal year incomes of at least EUR 10,000 for each employee that develops software activity; such employees will be taxed with 16% income tax. 

• The definition of the software activity has been amended by removing the condition for employer to realize a final product or a part of a final product having as purpose its commercialization. Thus, according to this new order, the software activity in the sense of the Fiscal Code, represents the effective provision of one of the software activities corresponding to the jobs mentioned into the annex to the order. Such amendment is welcome considering that the former definition of the software activity raised controversies in practice.