dismissed L-1B Case: Software Development

U.S. Citizenship 
and Immigration 
Services 
MATTER OF R-S-, INC. 
APPEAL OF VERMONT SERVICE CENTER DECISION 
Non-Precedent Decision of the 
Administrative Appeals Office 
DATE: SEPT. 25,2017 
PETITION: FORM I-129, PETITION FOR A NONIMMIGRANT WORKER 
The Petitioner, which provides workforce management software to retailers, seeks to temporarily 
employ the Beneficiary as an implementation specialist under the L-1 B nonimmigrant classification 
for intracompany transferees. See Immigration and Nationality Act (the Act) section 101(a)(15)(L), 
8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(L). The L-IB classification allows a corporation or other legal entity 
(including its affiliate or subsidiary) to transfer a qualifying foreign employee with "specialized 
knowledge" to work temporarily in the United States. 
The Director of the Vermont Service Center denied the petition, concluding that the record did not 
establish, as required, that the Beneficiary has been employed abroad, and will be employed in the 
United States, in a capacity involving specialized knowledge. 
The matter is now before us on appeal. In its appeal, the Petitioner submits additional evidence and 
asserts that the Director erred by not fully considering the complexity of the Beneficiary's work. 
Upon de novo review, we will dismiss the appeal. 
I. 'LEGAL FRAMEWORK 
To establish eligibility for the L-1 B nonimmigrant visa classification, a qualifying organization must 
have employed the beneficiary in a qualifying managerial or executive capacity, or in a position 
involving specialized knowledge, for one continuous year within the three years preceding the 
beneficiary's application for admission into the United States. Section 10l(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 specialized knowledge 
capacity. Id. 
The relevant statutory definition states that a beneficiary is considered to be serving in a capacity 
involving specialized knowledge with respect to a company if the beneficiary has a special knowledge 
of the company product and its application in international markets or has an advanced level of 
knowledge of processes and procedures of the company. Section 214(c)(2)(B) of the Act, 8 U.S.C. 
§ 1184(c)(2)(B). 
Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
Specialized knowledge is also defined as knowledge possessed by an individual of the petitioning 
organization's product, service, research, equipment, techniques, management or other interests and its 
application in international markets, or an advanced level of knowledge or expertise in the 
organization's processes and procedures. 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(l)(l)(ii)(D). 
An individual L-1 B classification petition must be accompanied by evidence that: (1) the petitioner 
and the foreign employer of the beneficiary are qualifying organizations; (2) the beneficiary has been 
employed abroad in a position that was managerial, executive, or involved specialized knowledge 
for at least one continuous year in the three years preceding the tiling of the petition; (3) the 
beneficiary is coming to work in the United States in a specialized knowledge capacity for the same 
employer or a subsidiary or affiliate of the foreign employer; and ( 4) the beneficiary's prior 
education, training and employment qualifies him or her to perform the intended services in the United 
States. 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(1)(3). 
II. SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE 
The sole issue to be addressed is whether the Petitioner established that the Beneficiary has been 
employed abroad, and will be employed in the United States, in a position involving specialized 
knowledge. 1 While the Beneficiary's intended U.S. position is not identical to the one he holds in 
India, the Petitioner has indicated that the Beneficiary's employment abroad and his intended 
employment in the United States both involve similar knowledge relating to the Petitioner's 
proprietary software. 
As a threshold issue, we must determine whether the Petitioner established that the Beneficiary 
possesses specialized knowledge. If the evidence is insufficient to establish that he possesses 
specialized knowledge, then we cannot conclude that he has been employed abroad in a position 
involving specialized knowledge or would be employed in the United States in a specialized 
knowledge capacity. 
A petitioner may establish eligibility by submitting evidence that the beneficiary and the proffered 
position satisfy either prong of the statutory definition of specialized knowledge. Under the statute, 
a beneficiary is considered to have specialized knowledge if he or she has: (I) a "special" 
knowledge of the company product and its application in international markets; or (2) an "advanced" 
level of knowledge of the processes and procedures of the company. Section 214( c )(2 )(B) of the 
Act. 
Once a petitioner articulates the nature of the claimed specialized knowledge, it is the weight and 
type of evidence which establishes whether or not the beneficiary actually possesses specialized 
knowledge. We cannot make a factual determination regarding a beneficiary's specialized 
knowledge if the petitioner does not, at a minimum, articulate with specificity the nature of the its 
1 
The Petitioner does not claim that the Beneficiary's foreign employment has been in an executive or managerial 
capacity. 
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Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
products and services or processes and procedures, the nature of the specific industry or field 
involved, and the nature of the beneficiary's knowledge. The petitioner should also describe how 
such knowledge is typically gained within the organization, and explain how and when the 
beneficiary gained such knowledge. 
As both "special" and "advanced" are relative terms, determining whether a given beneficiary's 
knowledge is "special" or "advanced" inherently requires a comparison of the beneficiary's 
knowledge against that of others. With respect to either special or advanced knowledge, the 
petitioner ordinarily must demonstrate that the beneficiary's knowledge is not commonly held 
throughout the particular industry and cannot be easily imparted from one person to another. The 
ultimate question is whether the petitioner has met its burden of demonstrating by a preponderance 
of the evidence that the beneficiary's knowledge or expertise is advanced or special, and that the 
beneficiary's position requires such knowledge. 
In the present case, the Petitioner has based its claims on both prongs of the statutory definition, 
asserting that the Beneficiary has a special knowledge of the company's products and their 
application in international markets and an advanced level of knowledge of the company's processes 
and procedures. 
The Petitioner has described itself as "the only provider of a fully integrated workforce management 
solution" comprising "web-enabled, Java-based products for use in the Retail and other sectors .... 
Though we use industry standard tools ... , our software products are proprietary in nature and 
contain hundreds of thousands of lines of code that are fully developed in-house." The Petitioner 
states that it employs "approximately 40 computer/software systems analysts and software 
programmers" who "are working on projects for the design, development, testing and integration and 
deployment of [the Petitioner's] products." The Petitioner indicated that the Beneficiary has worked 
abroad as a "Team Lead for Product Development," and that the Petitioner seeks to employ the 
Beneficiary in the United States as an "Implementation Specialist, a type of software engineer." The 
Petitioner stated: 
[T]here are no additional US workers with the requisite specialized knowledge of [the 
Petitioner's] suite of software ... products . . . . In order to relay the requirements for 
analysis, coding and testing to our developers [in] India, we need software specialists, 
including those like [the Beneficiary] and architects, who can understand the 
requirements to be analyzed, and the market, customer needs, design Issues, 
integration requirements, etc .... 
. . . [The Beneficiary] will use his specialized knowledge of ... [the Petitioner's] 
proprietary software applications ... to enhance the products and increase our sales. 
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Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
The Petitioner asserted that "[i]t takes a minimum of 12 months to train a software engineer ... 
before they can be assigned job responsibilities" like those of the Beneficiary's intended position. 
This training takes place both in the classroom and on the job. The Petitioner listed 520 hours of 
training courses that the Beneficiary took when he joined the foreign company in 2009, and stated: 
"There are only three employees in the Indian office and none in the US office who have undergone 
[the Beneficiary's] particular training," and "none of the other analysts has the same mix of product 
skills that he possesses." 
The Petitioner stated: 
[T]he training on the specific products is not imparted to all employees. Due to the 
integrated nature of the [Petitioner's] suite of products, different software engineers 
have expertise on different sections/modules . . . . Even within the same product ... , 
there are specific areas of specialization . . . . While all the software engineers .. . 
have completed training and work experience that might appear to be similar to 
that of [the Beneficiary], none of the other analysts has the same mix of product 
skills that he possesses. 
There are only three employees in the Indian office and none in the US office 
who have undergone [the Beneficiary's] particular training. 
The Petitioner stated that, unlike most of its employees, the Beneficiary was "additionally trained on 
·the architecture of the [company's] product suite, the Operating Model which is at the heart of the 
[company's] applications, the standards for integration development methodology and 
implementation methodology of [its] software products." 
The Petitioner asserts: 
People who undergo ... standard, core training in [the Petitioner's products] are only 
capable of developing software programs when given detailed specifications while a 
few select individuals such as [the Beneficiary] who have undergone additional 
specialized training, are able to develop such specifications . . . and, more 
importantly, able to develop integration across multiple products .... 
It should be emphasized that [the Beneficiary] has been ... [and] will be working on 
the process of the software development itself (represented by 'customizing' the base 
code to meet specific customer requirements) and not just providing consulting 
services to determine customer requirements. 
The Petitioner stated that the Beneficiary's specialized knowledge concerned the Petitioner's 
"application architecture," "configuration parameters," "database structure" and other elements, and 
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Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
that the processes and procedures include the Petitioner's "proprietary algorithms," "methodology," 
"database access control mechanism" and others. 
In a request for evidence (RFE), the Director stated that the training courses documented in the 
record appear to be "initial training" which a new employee would routinely receive. The Director 
also stated that "the Beneficiary's knowledge of the [Petitioner's] processes and procedures ... do 
not appear to be substantially different from, or advanced in relation to, that of any team lead." The 
Director stated the following: 
Developing specifications, testing and quality assurance are included in the job 
descriptions of any Team lead . . . . The documentation provided is insufficient to 
establish that the beneficiary's knowledge of [the Petitioner's] processes and 
procedures is advanced or specialized in relation to other employees or that the 
beneficiary's knowledge may be differentiated in any way from similar positions at 
other companies. Insider knowledge of a company's operations does not 
automatically constitute special or advanced knowledge. 
In response, the Petitioner repeated many of its prior assertions and stated that it had already 
submitted all the evidence and information requested in the RFE. The Petitioner contended that the 
Beneficiary's "knowledge ofthe functionality of[the Petitioner's] proprietary products ... is special 
-it is distinct and uncommon in comparison to that generally found in the particular industry." The 
Petitioner stated that the Beneficiary's knowledge is not common in the industry because the 
Petitioner's products are proprietary, and training in those products is only available within the 
petitioning organization. 
The Petitioner also submitted an organizational chart for the foreign entity, indicating that the 
company employs software engineers in four divisions: Coding, QA/Testing, Datab~se 
Management, and Integration. The Beneficiary's name appears under "Coding," with no indication 
as to how the Beneficiary's tasks differ from others in the Coding division. 
The Director denied the petition, stating that the Beneficiary's use of proprietary tools and 
methodologies appears to be "both incidental and commonplace among [the Petitioner's] 
employees," and "[t]he beneficiary's skills appear to be common among other consultants employed 
... in the field of information technology." The Director noted that the Beneficiary does not appear 
to have created the Petitioner's proprietary products. The Director found that the Petitioner had not 
sufficiently explained or supported its claim that the Beneficiary's past and intended future work 
involve specialized knowledge. The Director acknowledged the Beneficiary's training, but found 
that it appears to be routine introductory training common for new hires, and that the Petitioner had 
not shown how the Beneficiary's training distinguishes him from other employees. 
Most of the Petitioner's appellate brief repeats portions of the Petitioner's initial letter. Repetition of 
prior claims does not establish errors of fact or law in the Director's decision. The only new 
evidence submitted on appeal consists of copies of patents issued to the Petitioner. The Director did 
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Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
not question that the Petitioner has proprietary software and systems. Rather, the Director found that 
the Beneficiary's mastery of proprietary products does not automatically qualify as specialized 
knowledge. 
Because "special knowledge" concerns knowledge of the petitioning organization's products or 
services and its application in international markets, the petitioner may meet its burden through 
evidence that the beneficiary has knowledge that is distinct or uncommon in comparison to the 
knowledge of other similarly employed workers in the particular industry. 
"Special knowledge," however, does not simply mean familiarity with a particular company's 
products or services. Although the Petitioner has proprietary systems that its competitors lack and 
two U.S. patents, access to, and use of, proprietary information, technology, or software does not 
inherently constitute special knowledge. Otherwise, entire occupations would arguably fall under 
the definition. Only the Petitioner's software engineers have knowledge of the Petitioner's software; 
but the same can be said of the respective employees of every other company that creates proprietary 
software. 
The statutory ·definition of specialized knowledge requires us to make comparisons in order to 
determine what constitutes specialized knowledge. The term "specialized knowledge" is not an 
absolute concept and cannot be clearly defined. As observed in 1756, Inc. v. Att y Gen., 745 F. 
Supp. 9, 15 (D.D.C. 1990), "[s]imply put, specialized knowledge is a relative ... idea which cannot 
have a plain meaning." The Congressional record states that the L-1 category was intended for "key 
personnel." See H.R. Rep. No. 91-851, 1970 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2750. The term "key personnel" denotes 
a position that is "of crucial importance." Webster's II New Call. Dictionary 605 (Houghton Mifflin 
Co. 2001). In general, all employees can reasonably be considered "important" to a petitioner's 
enterprise. If an employee did not contribute to the overall economic success of an enterprise, there 
would be no rational economic reason to employ that person. An employee of "crucial importance" 
or "key personnel" must rise above the level of a petitioner's average employee. 
Accordingly, based on the definition of "specialized knowledge" and the congressional record 
related to that term, we must make comparisons not only between the claimed specialized 
knowledge employee and the general labor market, but also between that employee and the 
remainder of the Petitioner's workforce. The Petitioner indicates that "software engineers like [the 
Beneficiary]" possess special knowledge "[b]y nature of their work." Given such a broad claim, we 
must conclude that, while it may be correct to say that the Beneficiary is a skilled employee, these 
skills do not constitute special knowledge as defined at 8 C.F.R. § 214.2(l)(l)(ii)(D) and 
§ 214(c)(2)(B) ofthe Act. 
The Petitioner states that it "provided a detailed breakdown of the beneficiary's duties involving 
special knowledge of the employer's products." Those duties included the following examples: 
• Develop specifications for customizing and integrating [the Petitioner's] proprietary 
software products ... to specific customer needs[;] 
Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
• Test, configure, perform quality assurance and write implementation scripts for code 
to be delivered from India ... [;] 
• Plan, setup and maintain various databases . . . for running different versions of 
[several of the Petitioner's] products. Maintain and support these databases for 
optimal, ongoing performance to be used by customers ... [; and] 
• Discuss with customers, analyze and design solu~ions for integration of [the 
Petitioner's] products amongst themselves .... 
The Petitioner has not shown that these tasks meaningfully distinguish the Beneficiary from other 
software engineers. On appeal, the Petitioner states that the Director unfairly focused on the duties, 
such as those quoted above, without considering "the breakdown of specialized knowledge required 
to perform each job duty." The breakdown, however, simply listed the products and models needed 
for each duty, and stated that their use required certain "proprietary algorithms" and methodologies. 
Naming elements of the Beneficiary's work in this way does not establish that their use involves 
specialized knowledge. 
The Petitioner cites an unpublished appellate decision from 2013, in which we acknowledged that a 
beneficiary need not have developed a particular product in order to qualify for L-1 B status. The 
Petitioner contends that the beneficiary of the approved petition is comparable to the Beneficiary in 
the present proceeding. In the 2013 decision, however, we noted the beneficiary's "contributions to 
the field of circuit design in the form of publications" and four patents in the beneficiary's name 
among the evidence to show that the individual's specialized knowledge went beyond a particular 
level of familiarity with the employer's product. 
The Petitioner states that the Beneficiary's knowledge "is also advanced knowledge, since his 
specific training is not imparted to all employees." That is not· the definition of advanced 
knowledge; otherwise, all non-universal training would convey advanced knowledge. 
Because "advanced knowledge" concerns knowledge of an organization's processes and procedures, 
the petitioner may meet its burden through evidence that the beneficiary has knowledge of or 
expertise in the organization's processes and procedures that is greatly developed or further along in 
progress, complexity, and understanding in comparison to other workers in the employer's 
operations. Such advanced knowledge must be supported by evidence setting that knowledge apart 
from the elementary or basic knowledge possessed by others. 
The Petitioner has established that its software engineers are assigned specific roles within the 
company. While each role might be considered a "specialty" in the common usage of that term, this 
sort of compartmentalization does not mean that a worker holds "specialized knowledge" by virtue 
of performing a delegated function. As a member of the company's "Coding" group, the 
Beneficiary has knowledge not found among software engineers in "Database Management"; but the 
converse is also true. Differentiation of tasks is not tantamount to "specialization" for the purposes 
of the nonimmigrant classification. 
Matter of R-S-, Inc. 
The Petitioner has named products with which the Beneficiary works, and asserts that the 
Beneficiary's ability to write new code in order to customize products for clients is rare within the 
company, such that the Beneficiary is one of only three employees worldwide with his particular 
training. The Petitioner has also stated, however, that it "has obtained numerous L-1 B petition 
approvals for its employees in the same and similar positions." The records of proceedings for those 
other petitions are not before us, and therefore we cannot say whether or not they were properly 
approved, but the volume of filings undercuts the proposition that the Beneficiary's eligibility comes 
from being one of only three employees with a particular training history. Either that number is 
incorrect, or else it is irrelevant, because the Petitioner has not shown that the Beneficiary is only 
able to do his job because of the exact configuration of training courses that he completed. 
For the reasons discussed above, the evidence submitted does not establish that the Beneficiary 
possesses specialized knowledge and will be employed in a specialized knowledge capacity with the 
Petitioner in the United States. See Section 214( c )(2)(B) of the Act. Accordingly, the appeal will be 
dismissed. 
III. CONCLUSION 
The Petitioner did not establish that the Beneficiary's employment abroad, or intended employment 
in the United States, involve specialized knowledge. 
ORDER: The appeal is dismissed. 
Cite as Matter of R-S-. Inc., ID# 588873 (AAO Sept. 25, 2017) 
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