How to get an IMMEX program in Mexico

Most English-language explanations of IMMEX describe what the programme does. The questions people actually arrive with are narrower: can my company hold one, what do I have to promise, what goes in the file, and how long does it take.

This page answers those four with the article numbers, so you can check them against the decree rather than take them from a summary.

Editorial note. General information, not legal, tax or customs advice. The IMMEX Decree and the procedures under it are amended; requirements, formats and criteria change. Verify the text in force and work with qualified advisors before filing. This site is an independent editorial resource operated by Heberey LLC; it does not represent the Secretaría de Economía, the SAT or any authority.

Who can hold a program

Article 3 of the decree says the Secretaría de Economía may authorize a single programme to personas morales residentes en territorio nacional — legal entities resident in Mexican territory, as defined in Article 9, section II of the Código Fiscal de la Federación — that are taxed under Title II of the Income Tax Law.

Three consequences follow, and the first surprises most foreign enquirers:

• A company incorporated abroad cannot hold an IMMEX program. Residence in Mexico is part of the eligibility rule, not a formality.
• Individuals cannot hold one. The decree says personas morales.
• The tax regime matters. An entity taxed under a different regime than Title II does not meet the condition, regardless of what it manufactures.

So the honest answer to “do I need a Mexican corporation for IMMEX” is: either you incorporate one, or you produce under a programme that somebody else holds.

The five modalities, and the one built for foreign companies

Article 3 lists the modalities a programme may include:

The shelter modality is written into the decree for exactly the situation a foreign manufacturer is usually in: you want production in Mexico, you are supplying the designs and the material, and you do not have — or do not yet want — a Mexican entity of your own. Someone else holds the programme and carries its obligations; you supply and offtake. What that costs you in control and in margin is a separate question, and it is the right one to ask before treating shelter as the easy path. We compare the two routes in IMMEX versus shelter manufacturing.

What you commit to

The export commitment appears twice in the decree — once as something you state in the application (Article 11) and once as a standing obligation once you hold the programme (Article 24, section I):

annual foreign sales above USD 500,000 or its equivalent in national currency, or exports invoiced at no less than 10% of total invoicing

Read the connector. It is or, not and. A company whose total invoicing is modest can qualify on the percentage; a company with large domestic sales may find the percentage harder to reach than the dollar figure. Secondhand summaries frequently quote only the USD 500,000 and drop the alternative.

What goes in the file

Article 11 sets out the application and its attachments. In outline:

• The incorporation deed — a certified copy of the deed recording the company contract and, where applicable, amendments to the management and shareholding structure, showing the details of its entry in the corresponding Public Registry.
• Proof of legal possession of the premises where the programme will operate, stating the location and including photographs. Where possession is by lease or comodato, the contract must carry a minimum forced term of one year and must still have at least eleven months to run at the date the application is filed.
• Evidence that the export project exists — a maquila contract, a sale contract, purchase orders or firm orders.
• An investment program covering plans, location and photographs of the facilities; investment amounts in real estate, machinery and equipment; the number of people hired or to be hired, directly or indirectly; estimated value of imports over two years; and estimated production or service volume or value over the same period.

The lease detail catches people. A foreign company that signs a short or rolling lease while it “tests the market” can find the file rejected on the tenancy, not on the manufacturing case.

How long it takes

Article 11 is explicit:

The Secretaría must issue the resolution to an application for a Programme within fifteen business days, counted from the day after the application is filed. For other procedures related to a Programme, the period is ten business days.

And then the part worth knowing:

Once those periods have elapsed without a resolution being issued, the Secretaría is deemed to have resolved favourably, and will issue the corresponding resolution.

That is a positive administrative silence — the applicant benefits from the delay, not the other way round.

What those fifteen days do not cover. They start when a complete application is filed. They say nothing about incorporating the Mexican entity, obtaining the RFC and a valid e.firma, securing premises with a lease that survives the eleven-month test, or assembling the export evidence. In practice those steps, not the resolution, set the calendar.

The requirement that is not in the decree

Holding an IMMEX programme does not, by itself, let you import. Being the importer of record and being registered in the Padrón de Importadores are separate matters with their own rules, and a company can hold IMMEX while its registry status quietly blocks the first shipment. If that side is unresolved, start with what foreign companies do when the Mexican importer is not in place.

The same applies downstream. An IMMEX operation is efficient at importing temporarily; it does not make the finished good originate under USMCA. Those are different tests, decided by different rules.

Before you file

• Is there a Mexican entity, taxed under Title II, or is shelter the route?
• Which modality matches how production is actually organised?
• Which limb of the export commitment will you meet — the dollar figure or the percentage?
• Does the lease clear the one-year forced term and the eleven-month remainder?
• Is the export project documented in contracts or firm orders, not intentions?
• Who will run inventory control once the programme exists — the obligation that outlives the application?

That last question is the one most applications underrate. Obtaining the programme is a fifteen-business-day matter. Operating it — Anexo 24 inventory control, discharges, and reconciliation — is permanent, and it is where programmes are lost.

Recommended official sources

Check these before acting, because the decree and its procedures are amended:

• the IMMEX Decree in force, with its annexes, in the Diario Oficial de la Federación;
• the Secretaría de Economía procedure sheet for a new programme, for current requirements and formats;
• VUCEM, where the application is filed and signed with e.firma;
• and qualified advisors familiar with your sector and the sensitive-goods annexes.