New business visas from 29 March 2019: visa extension rules for entrepreneurs under new Innovator category
Tier 1 (Entrepreneur) visa is closing on 29 March 2019; a new Innovator category is succeeding it. This post is focusing on its criteria for extension of Innovator visa. Initial Innovator visa is issued for 3 years. After that, you can either apply for extension or for ILR, depending on what criteria you have met. Either way, you need another endorsement. If you haven’t met ILR criteria after 3 years, you need to obtain an ‘extension endorsement’, and apply for a visa based on it. Visa extension visa is for 3 years. There is no limit on how many extensions you can make, so if you need more time to qualify for ILR, you can apply for more extensions, every time for 3 years and every time with a new endorsement. In the past, during Tier 1 (Entrepreneur) visa, we had 4 main requirements: registering a business within 6 months, continuing to be active in a UK business, investing the whole £200,000 and creating 2 jobs. Now, under the new Innovator category, the criteria