R&D Credit Case Study
Software Development Shop
We partnered with an Illinois-based custom software development firm delivering high-complexity projects for clients across industries. While much of their work was performed under service contracts, the firm retained sufficient rights and financial risk in certain engagements to qualify for both the federal and Illinois R&D tax credits.
Federal Tax Credit
State Tax Credit
The Challenge
The company had previously worked with another R&D credit provider but found the process manual, disruptive, and burdensome for their delivery team. Although their engineers were building innovative and technically complex solutions, identifying eligible activities within client projects proved difficult without pulling key contributors away from billable work.
They knew they were leaving credits unclaimed and needed a faster, more accurate way to capture them.
Our Approach
InfoLink paired AI-powered discovery with expert-led analysis to surface qualifying activities embedded in client projects while minimizing time demands on the team.
Our process included:
Mapping engagements where the firm retained IP rights and financial risk, ensuring contract-based work met IRS and Illinois requirements for eligibility
Documenting technical uncertainty and processes of experimentation in areas such as new architectures, third-party integrations, and custom mobile application builds
Capturing contributions from engineers, architects, and project leads involved in solution design, prototyping, testing, and iterative development
Including eligible cloud infrastructure and support roles directly tied to experimentation and problem-solving
Each activity was matched to the IRS four-part test and documented for full audit defensibility under contract R&D rules.
The Outcome
The firm secured $135,000 in combined federal and Illinois R&D tax credits based on $1.5M in qualified expenses. The process was faster, more accurate, and significantly lighter on the delivery team compared to their previous provider. The result was measurable ROI without slowing down client projects.
