dismissed EB-2 NIW Case: Computer Science

(b)(6)
DATE: MAY 0 8 2015 OFFICE: TEXAS SERVICE CENTER 
IN RE: Petitioner: 
Beneficiary: 
U.S. Department of Homeland Security 
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services 
Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) 
20 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., MS 2090 
Washington, DC 20529-2090 
U.S. Citizenship 
and Immigration 
Services 
FILE: 
PETITION: Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker as a Member of the Professions Holding an Advanced 
Degree or an Alien of Exceptional Ability Pursuant to Section 203(b )(2) of the Immigration 
and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1153(b )(2) 
ON BEHALF OF PETITIONER: 
SELF-REPRESENTED 
INSTRUCTIONS: 
Enclosed please find the decision of the Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) in your case. 
This is a non-precedent decision. The AAO does not announce new constructions of law nor establish agency 
policy through non-precedent decisions. If you believe the AAO incorrectly applied current law or policy to 
your case or if you seek to present new facts for consideration, you may file a motion to reconsider or a 
motion to reopen, respectively. Any motion must be filed on a Notice of Appeal or Motion (Form I-290B) 
within 33 days of the date of this decision. Please review the Form I-290B instructions at 
http://www.uscis.gov/forms for the latest information on fee, filing location, and other requirements. 
See also 8 C.F.R. § 103.5. Do not file a motion directly with the AAO. 
Thank you, 
J!.�:���trative Appeals Office 
www.uscis.gov 
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DISCUSSION: The Director, Texas Service Center, denied the employment-based immigrant visa 
petition. The matter is now before the Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) on appeal. We will 
dismiss the appeal. 
The petitioner seeks classification under section 203(b )(2) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (the 
Act), 8 U.S.C. § 1153(b)(2), as a member of the professions holding the defined equivalent of an 
advanced degree. When he filed the petition, the petitioner was the chief executive officer (CEO) of 
He is also the founder and CEO of The petitioner asserts 
that an exemption from the requirement of a job offer, and thus of a labor certification, is in the national 
interest of the United States. The director found that the petitioner qualifies for classification as a 
member of the professions holding the equivalent of an advanced degree, but that the petitioner has not 
established that an exemption from the requirement of a job offer would be in the national interest of the 
United States. 
The petitioner submits additional evidence on appeal. 
I. Law 
Section 203(b) of the Act states, in pertinent part: 
(2) Aliens Who Are Members of the Professions Holding Advanced Degrees or Aliens of 
Exceptional Ability. -
(A) In General. - Visas shall be made available ... to qualified immigrants who are 
members of the professions holding advanced degrees or their equivalent or who 
because of their exceptional ability in the sciences, arts, or business, will substantially 
benefit prospectively the national economy, cultural or educational interests, or welfare 
of the United States, and whose services in the sciences, arts, professions, or business 
are sought by an employer in the United States. 
(B) Waiver of Job Offer-
(i) ... the Attorney General may, when the Attorney General deems it to be in 
the national interest, waive the requirements of subparagraph (A) that an alien's 
services in the sciences, arts, professions, or business be sought by an employer 
in the United States. 
The petitioner holds the equivalent of a U.S. baccalaureate degree in computer science from the 
followed by more than five years of progressive post-baccalaureate experience. 
This evidence suffices to establish the equivalent of a master's degree under 8 C.F.R. § 204.5(k)(2). 
The sole issue in contention is whether the petitioner has established that a waiver of the job offer 
requirement, and thus a labor certification, is in the national interest. 
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Neither the statute nor the pertinent regulations define the term "national interest." Additionally, 
Congress did not provide a specific definition of "in the national interest. " The Committee on the 
Judiciary merely noted in its report to the Senate that the committee had "focused on national interest by 
increasing the number and proportion of visas for immigrants who would benefit the United States 
economically and otherwise .... " S. Rep. No. 55, lOlst Cong. , 1st Sess., 11 (1989). 
In re New York State Dep't of Transportation, 22 I&N Dec. 215, 217-18 (Act. Assoc. Comm'r 1998) 
(NYSDOT), set forth several factors which must be considered when evaluating a request for a national 
interest waiver. First, a petitioner must establish that the beneficiary seeks employment in an area of 
substantial intrinsic merit. !d. at 217. Next, a petitioner must establish that the proposed benefit will be 
national in scope. !d. Finally, the petitioner seeking the waiver must establish that the beneficiary will 
serve the national interest to a substantially greater degree than would an available U.S. worker having 
the same minimum qualifications. !d. at 217-18. 
While the national interest waiver hinges on prospective national benefit, the petitioner must establish 
that the beneficiary's past record justifies projections of future benefit to the national interest. !d. at 
219. The petitioner's assurance that the beneficiary will, in the future, serve the national interest cannot 
suffice to establish prospective national benefit. The term "prospective" is included here to require 
future contributions by the beneficiary, rather than to facilitate the entry of a beneficiary with no 
demonstrable prior achievements, and whose benefit to the national interest would thus be entirely 
speculative. !d. 
II. Facts and Analysis 
The petitioner filed the Form I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker, on July 13, 2010. Part 6, line 
3 of the form included the following description of the petitioner's intended job: "Direct daily 
operations of software development, analyze workflow, establish priorities. Develop computer 
information resources, strategic computing, and disaster recovery. Knowle[ d]ge in ERP packages using 
SAP, EDI, Workflow, Business Connector, using ASP and .NET." 
An introductory statement submitted with the petition indicated that the petitioner's work serves the 
national interest because he "has immensely contributed to the progress of ecommerce through his 
design and development of business solutions which enables [sic] organizations to optimize the 
settlement process through electronic transactions. " The statement also indicated that the petitioner 
"has performed several large projects with Fortune 500 companies including 
, etc., " and "has been a recipient of 
(sic). The petitioner did not submit supporting evidence from the identified clients or 
from 
On his resume, the petitioner indicated that he has worked at 
serving client company , since 2009. 
that he served three clients ( 
The petitioner also indicated 
while employed at 
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from 2006 to 2009. The petitioner submitted two letters with the petition. 
identified as chief technology officer at stated: 
[The petitioner] is an outstanding Technology Architect and senior database specialist. 
He has been an outstanding contributor to our technology research team and a well 
experienced and knowledgeable resource .... 
[The petitioner's] contribution to our R&D [research and development] of global 
payment network solution is undisputable. He helped us design and re-engineer [a] 
major portion of our existing solution into a new generation of business-to-business 
eCommerce engine. This solution has helped us to strategically position our company 
for doing business globally and will improve our competitive positioning. 
identified as director of at stated that 
he supervised the petitioner on several projects and that "[s] ome of his work has been a major factor in 
our division's product success for launching· products .... " 
The director issued a request for evidence (RFE) on April 15, 2014. The director stated that the letters 
submitted with the petition "failed to demonstrate that the [petitioner] has a past record of specific prior 
achievement with some degree of influence on his field as a whole. " The director also noted that U.S. 
Citizenship and hnmigration Services (USCI S) inquiries revealed that ' is the brother of the 
petitioner," and that "the petitioner is the 1 00% owner of and 
In a statement responding to the RFE, the petitioner indicated that, in addition to working at 
the petitioner volunteers for The petitioner asserted that he "has been a driving 
force behind the recent boom in electronic payment systems in the United States," and that he has 
authored several articles relating to ecommerce, including "a white paper addressing the use of Data 
Analytics technology that can transform the U.S. banking sector." 
The petitioner submitted copies of four papers that he has written. The petitioner did not submit 
inform ation or evidence regarding the distribution of three of the papers, identified as "white papers," 
including the 2009 paper described above. The fourth paper, ' 
appeared in While the petitioner has indicated the potential of his papers to 
affect the U. S. banking sector, the record does not include evidence to establish that the papers have in 
fact influenced the field. 
The petitioner also submitted two unsigned letters in response to the RFE. One letter is attributed to 
, managing partner of the who has collaborated with the petitioner in the 
past. It states that the petitioner has recently begun offering technology based products to medical 
service providers, "resulting in reducing bad debt and improving collections rates from patients and 
payers." The letter also states that the petitioner's new products and services have "created several new 
jobs within his organization and externally within the organization's client base." The record does not 
include documentary evidence to support these assertions regarding the effects of the petitioner's 
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products and services. Statements made without supporting documentation are of limited probative 
value and are not sufficient to meet the burden of proof in these proceedings. Matter of So ffici, 22 
I&NDec. 158, 165 (Comm'r 1998) (citingMatter of TreasureCraft of Calif ornia, 14 I&N Dec.l90 
(Reg'l Comm'r 1972)). 
The second letter, attributed to 
the 
organization's annual conferences, and states: 
managing director of indicates that 
has invited the petitioner to speak at two of the 
During the course of my work in global payments I have seen less than a handful of 
technology companies achieve the technology achievement and the capability that 
has achieved (a company [the petitioner] co-funded). This can only be 
attributed to the abilities, vision and leadership [the petitioner] has contributed to the 
industry and has created several job opportunities and competitive advantage for their 
clients across [the] United States who adopted solutions. 
The annual conferences mentioned in the letter took place in 2013 and 2014. A web printout 
shows that the petitioner was also scheduled to speak at the 
in June 2014. These conferences took place several years after the petition's 2010 
filing date, and therefore cannot establish the petitioner's eligibility as of that date. An applicant or 
petitioner must establish that he or she is eligible for the requested benefit at the time of filing the 
benefit request. 8 C.F.R. § 103.2(b)(1). USCIS cannot properly approve the petition at a future date 
after the petitioner or beneficiary becomes eligible under a new set of facts. See Matter of Katigbak, 14 
I&N Dec. 45, 49 (Reg'l Comm'r 1971). 
The director denied the petition on August 11, 2014, stating that the submitted evidence "failed to 
demonstrate how [the petitioner's] contributions in his field are of such unusual significance that the 
petitioner merits the special benefit of a national interest waiver." The director acknowledged the 
assertion that the petitioner has made important innovations in his field, but found this assertion "was 
vague and never established how his innovation had some influence in the field as a whole." 
On appeal, the petitioner states that he "has made unusually significant contributions to the field of 
Information Technology and its application to electronic payment systems." He indicates that he is "the 
innovator and chief architect of a new payment system that is being launched from the United States in 
2015, allowing the payment and clearing of funds in real-time mode world-wide." The petitioner 
submits � . press release, dated July 1, 2014, which announces "the launch of 
, the industry's first global real-time payments network for domestic and international 
transaction processing for commercial trade." In addition, the petitioner submits a letter from 
, executive chairman of who asserts that the petitioner "is a well-respected 
industry contributor and subject matter expert in the banking technology and payment space in the 
United States," and that "[w]ithout [the petitioner's] continued contribution to Imtlat1ve, 
it would not be possible for us to achieve success and the project will be at risk." 
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The petitioner asserts that the project received the "innovation award" for 2014 from 
However, the record does not include any evidence regarding this 
award or establishing that the project has influenced the field of electronic payment 
processing since its creation. Further, as the did not exist when the petitioner filed the 
petition in 2010, its subsequent development cannot retroactively establish eligibility as of the filing_ 
date, as required by 8 C.P.R. § 103.2(b)(1). 
The record does not include documentary evidence to support the assertions by the petitioner and 
others, detailed above, regarding the petitioner's contributions to the progress of ecommerce. See 
Matter of Soffic i, 22 I&N Dec. at 165. 
III. Conclusion 
The petitioner has not established a past record of achievement at a level that would justify a waiver of 
the job offer requirement. The petitioner need not demonstrate notoriety on the scale of national 
acclaim, but the national interest waiver contemplates that his influence be national in scope. NYS DOT, 
22 I&N Dec. at 217, n.3. More specifically, the petitioner "must clearly present a significant benefit to 
the field of endeavor." !d. at 218. See also id. at 219, n.6 (the individual must have "a past history of 
demonstrable achievement vvith some degree of influence on the field as a whole"). 
As is clear from the statute, it was not the intent of Congress that every person qualified to engage in a 
profession in the United States should be exempt from the requirement of a job offer based on national 
interest. Likewise, it does not appear to have been the intent of Congress to grant national interest 
waivers on the basis of the overall importance of a given profession, rather than on the merits of the 
individual. On the basis of the evidence submitted, the petitioner has not established that a waiver of 
the requirement of an approved labor certification will be in the national interest of the United States. 
IV. Credibility 
As an additional matter, there are discrepancies and omissions in the record that call into question 
the petitioner's credib ility . Because we review the record on a de novo basis, we may identify 
additi onal issues of concern beyond what the Service Center identified in the initial decision. See 
Siddiqui v. Holder, 670 F.3d 736, 741 (7th Cir. 2012); So ltane v. DOJ, 381 F.3d 143, 145 (3d Cir. 
2004); Dar v. INS, 891 F.2d 997, 1002 n. 9 (2d Cir. 1989). 
The credibility of the petitioner's assertions is material to the proceeding. Section 204(b) of the Act, 
8 U.S. C. § 1154(b ), provides for the approval of immigrant petitions only upon a determination that 
"1he facts stated in the petition are true." See section 204(b) of the Act, 8 U. S.C. § 1154(b); see also 
Systronics Corp. v. INS, 153 F. Supp. 2d 7, 15 (D.D.C. 2001). 
The record includes a number of assertions by the petitioner that are unsubstantiated, or that show 
significant omissions. On Form I-140, the petitioner stated his occupation as "Database Administrator" 
(Part 5, line 3), and that he seeks employment as an "MI S [management information systems] manager" 
(Part 6, line 1). On his accompanying resume, the petitioner listed "functional roles" such as "Project 
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Manager/Technical Lead/Architect" and "Database Designer," and stated that, since June 2009, he had 
served as a "Sr. Technical Architect/Lead" at with identified as a 
"client." The petitioner did not acknowledge his leadership roles at 1 
until the director, in the RFE, disclosed that USCIS was aware of those facts. Doubt cast on any aspect 
of the petitioner's proof may lead to a reevaluation of the reliability and sufficiency of the remaining 
evidence offered in support of the petition. Matter of Ho, 19 I&N Dec. 582, 591 (BIA 1988). 
On his resume, under "Education," the petitioner stated: "MBA. (Part-time) at 
PA (2009)." A transcript from the university does not show that he received the degree or that he 
passed all required courses. The petitioner submitted a photocopied certificate that stated he 
"successfully complet[ ed] all requirements of the Class of 2009 MBA Program," but the certificate 
bears no seal, watermark, or other indication that is the source of the document. 
The petitioner's repeated submission of incomplete or misleading information raises doubts under 
Matter of Ho which reflect on other elements of the record, for example the petitioner's submission of 
unsigned letters and unsubstantiated references to awards. These issues diminish the weight of 
assertions made in support of the petition. 
We will dismiss the appeal for the above stated reasons. In visa petition proceedings, it is the 
petitioner's burden to establish eligibility for the immigration benefit sought. Section 291 of the Act, 
8 U.S.C. § 1361; Matter of Otiende, 26 I&N Dec. 127, 128 (BIA 2013). Here, the petitioner has not 
met that burden. 
ORDER: The appeal is dismissed.