An L-1 is argued on a relationship, not on a person.

Two very different adjudications

An established US entity applying for an employee has operating history: tax returns, payroll, contracts, an organisation chart. A new office has none of that. The first petition is decided largely on whether the business plan is credible enough to justify a one-year commitment, and the extension later is decided on whether that plan was delivered.

That symmetry is the part applicants underestimate. The document you submit becomes the standard you are measured against twelve months later.

Who this is for

• A company transferring a manager or executive to a US parent, branch, subsidiary or affiliate.
• A company transferring a worker with specialised knowledge of its products, processes or systems.
• An owner opening a first US office for an existing foreign business, where the plan has to do the work.

Three arguments, in order

The qualifying relationship: ownership and control between the foreign and US entities, documented rather than asserted. Affiliates held through individuals are where this usually gets thin.

The qualifying role: managerial or executive capacity, or specialised knowledge. A manager who spends the week doing the work rather than directing it is a common failure, and the plan has to describe the role honestly.

The capacity to pay and to operate: for a new office, premises, staffing, capital and a first-year revenue path that does not rest on optimism.

What a reviewer compares

• Corporate documents against the described ownership chain
• Organisation chart against the role description
• Capital and cost estimates against the stated operations
• The plan against the company's actual foreign business, which is already on file

Recurring weaknesses

• A relationship described in prose but not evidenced by registry documents, share registers or agreements.
• A role titled as manager, described as specialist, and evidenced as a salesperson.
• A new office plan with no premises, no named hires and no capital figure.
• An organisation chart where the transferee holds every function, which reads as a one-person operation rather than a managed entity.
• Specialised knowledge claimed without a proprietary process, system or product to point at.

These are not filing errors. They are the difference between a petition that answers the questions and one that invites them.

Why the first-year plan matters twice

A new office petition buys a shorter initial period than an established entity. What follows depends on whether the office exists, hired, and produced what the plan said it would.

The document set

• Business plan for the US entity, written to the new-office standard where there is no operating history.
• Corporate relationship map with the supporting evidence identified for each link.
• Role description aligned with the organisational structure rather than with the job title.
• First-year operating budget: premises, payroll, compliance, working capital.
• Milestone view so that the extension case can be built from the plan rather than against it.

What we need from you

Registry documents for both entities, the ownership chain, the foreign company's financials, and an honest description of what the transferee will actually do in the first months.

Four stages

Relationship audit: whether the ownership and control path can be documented as it stands.

Role design: the position described in terms the adjudicator can test.

Modelling: the first-year cost and revenue logic, sized to the capital actually available.

Drafting and revision, with your counsel's comments folded back in.

Who does what

Counsel owns eligibility, the one-year employment requirement and the filing. We own the business analysis and the document that carries it.

Three things outside the file

It does not establish the qualifying relationship where none exists. Structure is a legal and corporate question.

It does not choose the business model for the US entity. That sits in market entry.

It does not run the office after approval, which is what the extension actually depends on: growth strategy.

Related documents

Where the same investment also needs a treaty investor case, the documents differ in what they must prove: E-2 business plan.

Where this work leads

One document answers one reader, but the question behind it rarely stays inside a single direction.

• Growth Strategy

The level above

Documents solve a defined file. Where the decision itself is open, the work moves up a level, into a direction, and eventually into growth strategy.