A qualifying relationship, one continuous year of qualifying employment abroad in the previous three years, and a U.S. role requiring specialized knowledge of the company's own product, process or procedure.
The knowledge belongs to the company, not the trade
Specialized knowledge means knowledge of the petitioning organization's product, service, research, equipment, techniques, management or procedures, or an advanced level of knowledge of its processes. It is knowledge that belongs to the company rather than to the trade, which is why authorship and internal documentation carry so much weight here. The U.S.
position must require that knowledge; possessing it is not by itself sufficient. The corporate conditions match the managerial route: parent, branch, subsidiary or affiliate, with both entities actively doing business. The employment year must be continuous, full-time and inside the three years before the petition.
Two limits then shape the assignment: status in this category is capped at five years, and time already spent in the United States in an L category generally counts toward that cap, so it should be calculated before the transfer is designed.