Under Taiwan’s SME Standard (amended June 2020), a company qualifies as an SME with paid-in capital of NT$100M or less OR fewer than 200 regular employees — meeting either criterion suffices, in any industry. The law defines only two layers (SME and small-scale enterprise); AI DD Map adds its own quick capital grade: micro (<NT$1M), small (1M–10M), medium (10M–100M), large (≥100M). “Small-scale enterprises” are those with fewer than 5 regular employees.
Since the June 2020 amendment, manufacturing and services share one standard: paid-in capital ≤ NT$100M OR fewer than 200 regular employees. Before that, manufacturing/construction/mining had separate thresholds — older articles often still cite the two-track rules, so mind the date.
Micro under NT$1M; small NT$1M–10M; medium NT$10M–100M; large ≥NT$100M (above the SME ceiling).
These tiers are our own quick-comparison grade, not a legal classification; subsidies, credit guarantees and tax incentives use only the statutory test above.
Qualification and tiers use paid-in capital (what shareholders actually contributed), not the authorized capital in the charter — the two can differ a lot. AI DD Map shows both on the company card and always tiers by paid-in; sole proprietorships have no paid-in capital, which is normal.
It gates several government resources: SME Administration counseling and subsidies, credit-guarantee-fund financing, tax incentives under the SME Development Act, and set-asides in government procurement. For counterparties, the tier is also a first-glance proxy for scale.
Capital is a quick proxy for scale and ability to perform, but only one dimension — combine with status, age and litigation.
Per the SME White Paper, SMEs are 98%+ of all Taiwanese enterprises and about 80% of employment.
Open the Landscape map →No — registered capital is not actual financial strength; still check litigation and penalties.
Searching it in AI DD Map auto-labels micro/small/medium/large.
In practice it follows labor-insurance enrollment numbers, not peak headcount including temps/dispatch workers.
No. The SME Standard defines only SMEs (capital ≤ NT$100M or < 200 employees) and small-scale enterprises (< 5 employees). Micro/small/medium tiers you see elsewhere are institutional or statistical conventions — as are our capital tiers.
Small-scale enterprises are a subset of SMEs — fewer than 5 regular employees; several support programs target them specifically.