dismissed L-1A Case: Artificial Intelligence

U.S. Citizenship 
and Immigration 
Services 
Non-Precedent Decision of the
Administrative Appeals Office 
Date: JUNE 25, 2024 In Re: 31497377 
Appeal of Texas Service Center Decision 
Form 1-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker (L-lA Manager or Executive) 
The Petitioner, engaged in research and development of artificial intelligence (Al), seeks to 
temporarily employ the Beneficiary as its chiefresearch officer (CRO) under the L-lA nonimmigrant 
classification for intracompany transferees. See Immigration and Nationality Act (the Act) section 
10l(a)(15)(L), 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(L). The L-lA classification allows a corporation or other legal 
entity, including its affiliate or subsidiary, to transfer a qualifying foreign employee to the United 
States to work temporarily in a managerial or executive capacity. 
The Director of the Texas Service Center denied the petition, concluding that the record did not 
establish that the Beneficiary has been employed abroad in a qualifying capacity. The matter is now 
before us on appeal under 8 C.F.R. § 103.3. 
The Petitioner bears the burden of proof to demonstrate eligibility by a preponderance of the evidence. 
Matter of Chawathe, 25 l&N Dec. 369, 375-76 (AAO 2010). We review the questions in this matter 
de novo. Matter of Christo 's, Inc., 26 I&N Dec. 537, 537 n.2 (AAO 2015). Upon de novo review, 
we will dismiss the appeal. 
I. LAW 
To establish eligibility for the L-lA nonimmigrant visa classification, a qualifying organization must 
have employed the beneficiary "in a capacity that is managerial, executive, or involves specialized 
knowledge," for one continuous year within three years preceding the beneficiary's application for 
admission into the United States. Section 101(a)(15)(L) of the Act. In addition, the beneficiary must 
seek to enter the United States temporarily to continue rendering his or her services to the same 
employer or a subsidiary or affiliate thereof in a managerial or executive capacity. Id. The petitioner 
must also establish that the beneficiary's prior education, training, and employment qualify him or her 
to perform the intended services in the United States. 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(1)(3). 
II. ANALYSIS 
The Director determined that the Petitioner did not establish that the Beneficiary has been employed 
abroad in a qualifying capacity. The Petitioner does not claim that the Beneficiary has been employed 
abroad in a capacity that is managerial or involves specialized knowledge. Therefore, we restrict our 
analysis to whether the Beneficiary has been employed abroad in an executive capacity. 
"Executive capacity" means an assignment within an organization in which the employee primarily 
directs the management of the organization or a major component or function of the organization; 
establishes the goals and policies of the organization, component, or function; exercises wide latitude in 
discretionary decision-making; and receives only general supervision or direction from higher-level 
executives, the board of directors, or stockholders of the organization. Section 10l(a)(44)(B) of the Act. 
To show that a beneficiary's past experience qualifies as an executive capacity, the petitioner must 
show that the beneficiary performed all four of the high-level responsibilities set forth in the statutory 
definition at section 101 (a)( 44 )(B) of the Act. The petitioner must then prove that the beneficiary was 
primarily engaged in executive duties, as opposed to ordinary operational activities alongside other 
employees. See Family Inc. v. USCIS, 469 F.3d 1313, 1316 (9th Cir. 2006). In determining whether 
the beneficiary's duties were primarily executive, we consider the description of the job duties, the 
company's organizational strncture, the duties of the beneficiary's subordinate employees, the 
presence of other employees to relieve the beneficiary from performing operational duties, the nature 
of the business, and any other factors that will contribute to understanding the beneficiary's actual 
duties and role in the business. 
The statutory definition of the term "executive capacity" focuses on a person's elevated position. 
Under the statute, a beneficiary must have the ability to "direct the management" and "establish the 
goals and policies" of an organization or major component or function thereof. Section 10l(a)(44)(B) 
of the Act. To show that a beneficiary will "direct the management" of an organization or a major 
component or function of that organization, a petitioner must show how the organization, major 
component, or function is managed and demonstrate that the beneficiary primarily focuses on its broad 
goals and policies, rather than the day-to-day operations of such. 
An executive directs the management of the organization, major component, or essential function of 
a given organization by controlling the work of managerial or lower-level executive employees. See 
generally 2 USCIS Policy Manual L.6(D),https://www.uscis.gov/policy-manual. See also BlueStar 
Cabinets, Inc. v. Jaddou, No. 21-10116, 2022 WL 4364734, at *7 (5th Cir. Sept. 21, 2022) (holding 
that '"[d]irect[ing] the management of the organization' necessarily includes directing managers of 
the organization.") 
In his native China, the Beneficiary earned a bachelor's degree in computer science in 2000 and led a 
technology company from 2004 to 2010. He then invested in other companies, and traveled to the 
United Kingdom to earn master's degrees in management and machine learning. In January 2022, the 
Beneficiary co-founded the Petitioner's foreign affiliate and began working as its CRO. The Petitioner 
stated that, as CRO, the Beneficiary "leads [the affiliate's] research and development efforts." The 
Petitioner filed the petition in August 2023, providing the following breakdown of the time the 
Beneficiary devotes to various responsibilities: 
• Overseeing all aspects of the research and development process ( 60% of the time); 
• Ensuring compliance with ethical guidelines and regulations related to research 
(10% of the time); 
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• Building and maintaining relationships with internal and external stakeholders 
(15% of the time); and 
• Developing and managing research budgets and timelines, ensuring that projects 
are completed on time and within budget. (15% of the time) 
Under the heading "Overseeing all aspects of the research and development process," the Petitioner 
listed four sub-categories: 
• Developing research goals and strategies that aligns [sic] with [ the affiliate' s] 
overall goals and objectives. 
• Managing the research team and providing leadership and direction to ensure high­
quality research outcomes. 
• Encouraging collaboration between researchers and other stakeholders, both within 
and outside your [sic] organization. 
• Managing research projects to ensure that they are completed on time, within 
budget, and to the required standards. 
As evidence intended to show that the Beneficiary directs the management of a major component of 
the foreign affiliate, the Petitioner submitted an organizational chart and job descriptions for the 
Beneficiary's claimed subordinates. The Petitioner later supplemented this information in response to 
a request for evidence (RFE). The Petitioner claimed the following structure subordinate to the 
Beneficiary: 
• 2 part-time Research Leads (RLs) 
o 3 full-time Research Engineers 
• Part-time Technology Lead (TL) 
• Full-time Strategic Research Lead (SRL) 
o Part-time Research Associate 
o 3 part-time Research Assistants 
The Petitioner stated that the individuals in part-time positions work up to 20 hours per week. 
The Petitioner asserted that the RLs "[l]ead and manage a team ofresearchers" and "[d]evelop research 
plans"; the TL "[m]anage[s] and lead[s] a team of technology professionals, including developers, 
engineers and analysts"; and the SRL "[d]evelop[ s] and implement[ s] a strategic research plan" and 
"[l]ead[s] and manage[s] research projects." The Petitioner also submitted copies of the foreign 
affiliate's monthly payroll records from January 2022 through June 2023. 
The Director denied the petition, stating that the Petitioner had not submitted documentary "evidence 
of the Beneficiary overseeing or directing employees or making senior-level decisions for the 
company." The Director acknowledged the "list of the Beneficiary's foreign subordinate staff," but 
concluded that the Petitioner "did not provide probative documentary evidence to demonstrate these 
individuals were employed by the foreign entity," or to show sufficient lower-level subordinate staff 
to allow the Beneficiary to have worked primarily as an executive, and his immediate subordinates to 
have worked as managers. 
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On appeal, the Petitioner asserts that it had submitted ample evidence, including organizational charts, 
job descriptions, performance evaluations, and other materials. The Petitioner contends that the 
payroll records and other materials establish the staffing of the foreign entity. 
Review of the submitted documents leads us to conclude that those materials are not sufficient to meet 
the Petitioner's burden of proof. 
The Beneficiary's foreign job description contains what appear to be overlapping items. Under the 
heading "[o ]verseeing all aspects of the research and development process," the Petitioner indicated 
that the Beneficiary is responsible for "ensuring that projects are completed on time and within 
budget." But a separate category in the job description repeats this assertion, indicating that the 
Beneficiary spends an additional 15% of his time "[m ]anaging research projects to ensure that they 
are completed on time and within budget." The description provides few details about the specific 
tasks the Beneficiary performs in order to manage the projects. Specifics are clearly an important 
indication of whether a beneficiary's duties are primarily executive or managerial in nature, otherwise 
meeting the definitions would simply be a matter of reiterating the regulations. F edin Bros. Co., Ltd. 
v. Sava, 724 F. Supp. 1103, 1108 (E.D.N.Y. 1989), affd, 905 F.2d 41 (2d. Cir. 1990). Reciting the 
beneficiary's vague job responsibilities or broadly-cast business objectives is not sufficient; the 
regulations require a detailed description of the beneficiary's daily job duties. The actual duties 
themselves will reveal the true nature of the employment. Id. 
Gaps and inconsistencies in the record raise particular concerns about the claim that the Beneficiary 
directs the management of a component of the organization. The submitted job descriptions for the 
Beneficiary's claimed subordinates are not fully consistent with the organizational chart. The chart 
shows subordinates for the SRL who are not mentioned in the SRL's job description. 
The submitted evidence is not sufficient to establish that the TL is a manager as claimed. The TL's 
job description indicates that the TL oversees a "team ... of developers, engineers, and analysts," but 
the record indicates otherwise. The organizational chart does not show any developers or analysts, 
and it does not indicate that the TL has any subordinates. In a letter submitted in response to the RFE, 
the Petitioner acknowledged that the TL "currently doesn't yet have any supporting staff working 
under him." Because eligibility rests in part on the Beneficiary's past employment abroad, the job 
descriptions of the Beneficiary's claimed subordinates must reflect the responsibilities and duties that 
they had during the time of the Beneficiary's qualifying employment abroad. If the TL had no "team 
... of developers, engineers, and analysts," then the submitted job description does not accurately 
reflect the TL's position as it existed during the relevant period. A petitioner must meet all eligibility 
requirements at the time of filing. See 8 C.F.R. § 103.2(b)(l). In this instance, the Petitioner must 
establish the existence of a management structure for the Beneficiary to direct as of the August 2023 
filing date. 
The foreign affiliate's organizational chart shows 22 positions, but monthly payroll records from 2022 
and 2023 show, at most, only half that number of employees; the number of employees grew from 2 
in January 2022 to 11 in June 2023. The June 2023 payroll statement, the most recent one submitted 
with the petition, shows only four of the employees said to be under the Beneficiary's authority: a 
research engineer who first appears on the February 2023 payroll record; two other research engineers, 
both first appearing on the May 2023 record; and the SRL, first paid in November 2022. Thus, the 
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payroll records indicate that 7 of the 11 positions subordinate to the Beneficiary were vacant as late as 
June 2023, and none of them were filled before November 2022. 
The deficient staffing evidence is particularly important because the Beneficiary must have served in 
a qualifying capacity abroad for at least one continuous year. See section 10l(a)(l5)(L) of the Act; 
see also 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(1)(1 )(i) and (3)(iii). The submitted job descriptions and organizational charts 
identify 11 individuals with 6 different titles subordinate to the Beneficiary, but as recently as January 
2023, seven months before the Petitioner filed the petition, the foreign affiliate had only four 
employees other than the Beneficiary and the chief executive officer (CEO). In August 2022, a year 
before the filing date, the foreign affiliate had only two employees other than the Beneficiary and the 
CEO, and only one of those employees, a research engineer, was purportedly subordinate to the 
Beneficiary. Therefore, this evidence indicates that the organizational structure integral to the 
Beneficiary's claimed executive capacity did not exist a year before the August 2023 filing date. As 
such, the evidence does not indicate that the Beneficiary had been directing the management of the 
foreign affiliate for at least one continuous year at the time of filing, because there was no lower 
management structure for him to direct for much of that time. 
The Petitioner's response to the RFE includes copies of performance evaluations that the Beneficiary 
purports to have undertaken for his claimed subordinates. The evaluations are all dated June 30, 2023, 
labeled as covering the first two quarters of 2023. But three of these four individuals are not named 
on any of the foreign affiliate's payroll records. The Petitioner submitted a copy of the "Principal 
Statement of Terms and Conditions of Employment" executed when the foreign affiliate hired the SRL 
in 2022, but the record does not contain similar documents for the TL or RLs. The Petitioner's 
submission of organizational charts, job descriptions, and evaluations does not account for the absence 
of the TL and RLs from the foreign affiliate' s payroll records. The Petitioner is responsible for 
resolving discrepancies in the record with independent, objective evidence pointing to where the truth 
lies. See Matter ofHo, 19 I&N Dec. 582, 591-92 (BIA 1988). 
The record contains a January 2022 agreement between the foreign affiliate and a contracting 
company. The Petitioner does not specifically claim that the TL and the RLs are contractors rather 
than employees. Even if they are contractors, the burden is on the Petitioner to establish that the 
foreign affiliate's claimed personnel structure actually exists, and that those personnel are performing 
the tasks claimed. The agreement with the contracting company does not identify the individuals who 
are assigned to work for the petitioning company, and the Petitioner has not submitted statements of 
work or other materials from the contracting company to specify the contracted tasks and 
responsibilities of contracted personnel. 
The agreement specifies that the foreign entity would pay the contractor £82.50 per hour, "on 
submission of an invoice from the Contractor for the work completed that month." The Petitioner has 
not submitted copies of these invoices. The TL's claimed compensation matches the contractor's 
hourly rate. This information is consistent with the TL being a contractor, but it does not establish 
that the TL is a manager working under the Beneficiary's executive authority. As noted above, the 
Petitioner acknowledged that the TL has no "team" as claimed in the job description, and the Petitioner 
has not explained how the TL qualifies as a manager in the absence of any subordinate staff. The two 
part-time RLs are said to receive fixed monthly salaries, rather than the hourly rate specified in the 
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contracting agreement in the record. But the record does not appear to contain evidence of the RL' s 
compensation either as employees or as contractors. 
The Petitioner states that the foreign entity's bank statements show payments to the contractor, but the 
Petitioner did not submit itemized invoices that might have shed more light on the services provided 
and the staff that provided those services. Given this lack of detail, the agreement does not fill the 
staffing gap between the payroll records and the organizational chart. 
Furthermore, the agreement stipulates that "[t]he Contractor will not work under the direction and 
control of the Company." The Petitioner has not established that the Beneficiary has executive-level 
authority over the actions of the contractor's employees. 
Because the payroll records and other materials in the record do not corroborate the organizational 
chart, those materials do not suffice to show that the Beneficiary directed the management of a 
component of the foreign affiliate, and did so for at least one continuous year as required by the statute 
and regulations. 
The description of the Beneficiary's claimed duties with the foreign affiliate relies on the presence of 
four subordinate managers and seven lower-level workers. We agree with the Director that the 
Petitioner has not adequately documented the presence of this subordinate staff. Therefore, we agree 
with the Director's determination that the Petitioner has not met its burden of proof to establish, by a 
preponderance of the evidence, that the Beneficiary was employed abroad in a primarily executive 
capacity. We will dismiss the appeal for this reason. 
III. ADDITIONAL ISSUE 
Beyond the Director's decision, we note that the record raises questions about the extent to which the 
petitioning U.S. employer and its foreign affiliate were doing business at the time of filing. Both 
employers must be doing business at the time of filing. See 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(l)(l)(ii)(G). The 
regulations define doing business as the regular, systematic, and continuous provision of goods, 
services, or both. The definition does not include the mere presence of an agent or office. A 
petitioning U.S. employer filing as a new office does not need to show that it is already doing business. 
See 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(1)(1)(ii)(F) and (3)(v). But the Petitioner did not claim, either on Form I-129 or 
elsewhere in the record, to be filing a petition as a new office. 
The Petitioner asserted that its "[ a ]ffiliate is clearly [ engaged in the] regular, systematic, and 
continuous provision of services," but the Petitioner did not provide sufficient evidence to support that 
claim. In a statement submitted with the petition, the Petitioner described the foreign affiliate as a 
"start-up business ... at its early developing stage" that "aims to start generating income in 2024," 
after the August 2023 filing date. Bank statements in the record show no apparent income from 
business activity in 2022 or 2023. Apart from infusions of capital, nearly all the deposits into the 
affiliate's bank accounts were refunds from vendors and tax authorities. The statements do not identify 
the purpose of the few remaining deposits, but those deposits appear to be too few in number to 
establish regular, systematic, and continuous provision of goods or services. A promotional brochure 
submitted with the petition identifies several "companies using [the foreign affiliate's] chatbot," but 
the Petitioner submitted no evidence to support this claim. 
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The Petitioner also did not submit sufficient evidence that the petitioning U.S. entity was doing 
business at the time it filed the petition. Copies of recent income tax returns, submitted with the 
petition, show minimal income, entirely from passive sources. The 2020 tax return shows $10,693 in 
income, all from interest. The 2021 return shows $2,547 in interest, $1,887 in dividends and 
inclusions, and a $6 refund. On its 2022 return, the Petitioner reported $20,666 in dividends and 
inclusions and $1,466 in interest. None of the returns shows any income from actively providing 
goods or services. 
The Petitioner's profit and loss statement for the period from March 1 to June 20, 2023, shows $13,521 
in sales income in March, with no income from any source in April, May, or June. The Petitioner did 
not explain how this minimal and sporadic income is consistent with the regular, systematic, and 
continuous provision of goods or services. 
The above information about the business activity of the Petitioner and its foreign affiliate did not 
form a basis for denial of the petition, but must be resolved in any future filings by the Petitioner. 
IV. CONCLUSION 
The Petitioner has not met its burden of proof to establish that the Beneficiary has been employed 
abroad in a qualifying capacity. Therefore, we will dismiss the appeal. 
ORDER: The appeal is dismissed. 
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