First, let me mention a small pitfall I ran into myself.
Last Friday, on a third-party policy platform, I saw the “2026 Guangming District Industry and Information Technology Field Digital Platform and Software Application Subsidy Project,” and the application dates were listed as November 9 to November 20. When I found the original text on Guangming District Government Online, the title was “Notice on Issuing the Application Guidelines for 3 Subsidy Projects Such as the 2025 Network Upgrade and Transformation in the Industry and Information Technology Field of Guangming District,” and the attachment names were also all “2025” (Shenzhen Guangming District Enterprise Development Service Center, published on Guangming District Government Online on 2026-11-05; information source: Guangming District Industry and Information Technology Bureau).
It is not a typo. The guideline 'VIII. Notes (1)' states clearly: the funding scope covers project investments actually incurred by the applicant unit during January 1, 2025 to December 31, 2025. Therefore, this is a retrospective funding that opens the application window in 2026 to cover investments for the 2025 fiscal year. The third-party platform mistook the 'application year' for the 'project year'.
This difference is not a word game. If your company made no software investment in 2025, or if the investment occurred in 2026, seeing the '2026 project' can easily lead you to prepare a whole round of materials in vain. When citing the policy, you should still go back to that page on the official website.
First, remove the three types of funds from the reporting scope
The funding standard itself is straightforward: a subsidy of 30% of the project's actual investment in the previous calendar year (software purchase costs, implementation service fees, software maintenance fees, etc.), with a maximum of 2 million yuan per enterprise, provided as post-event funding (Shenzhen Guangming District Enterprise Development Service Center, "Guangming District Industry and Information Technology Field 2025 Digital Platform and Software Application Funding Project Application Guide," 2026-11-05, "II. Supported Objects, Directions, Methods and Standards"; the denominator for the 30% is the project's actual investment in the 2025 calendar year, and 2 million yuan is the upper limit per enterprise).
What really determines how much can be reimbursed is the "note" that immediately follows. I divide the parts that are not counted into three categories according to their nature:
Category 1: systems not integrated with production and manufacturing systems. The guideline’s positive list sets out the scope eligible for inclusion: information system application software integrated with production and manufacturing systems, such as R&D design, production management, production control, supply chain management, enterprise resource management, and energy management (excluding embedded device software), and it explicitly requires that systems related to design, simulation, supply chain management, customer service, etc. must be integrated with production and manufacturing systems. The negative list also explicitly names: financial management systems, office automation systems, corporate website construction, e-commerce application software, as well as expenses for software legalization for non-informatization purposes, drawing software (Adobe Illustrator), design software (Photoshop), etc., which are not counted.
The second category: cloud rental fees. The original parenthetical note refers to rental fees for public cloud servers, cloud storage, cloud containers, etc. This item has the most direct impact on enterprises adopting SaaS or cloud subscription models.
The third category: money whose timing does not fall within 2025. The project contract signing date must not be earlier than January 1, 2022; the invoice date must not be later than the project application date; and the payment date must fall between January 1 and December 31, 2025. The contract was signed early, the invoice was issued late, and the payment was only made in January 2026—if even one of these three is out of alignment, this sum is at risk.
Take one example: for an enterprise's 2025 ERP implementation contract worth RMB 2 million, RMB 600,000 of it was the annual fees for the finance module, OA, and cloud hosting, all invoiced under the same contract with no itemized pricing. Under the guidelines, only RMB 1.4 million can be included in the declaration base, and 30% corresponds to RMB 420,000. If the pricing had been itemized by module and the implementation service fee and cloud leasing had been invoiced separately, this RMB 420,000 could be calculated clearly; without itemization, it must be split manually, and whatever cannot be split can only be abandoned.
An honest caveat here: the guidelines state that “funding is subject to unified adjustments to the funding amount, support ratio, and disbursement schedule based on the annual district economic development special fund budget arrangements and application situation, and applicants shall unconditionally agree to the adjustment results.” In other words, both 30% and 2 million yuan are upper limits, not committed amounts. When making cash flow projections, do not calculate based on the full amount.
“At least 3 key stages” must be proven with system screenshots and the number of integrations
Among the application requirements, two are hard prerequisites unrelated to money, but they are the ones most likely to be left for last-minute cramming:
First, the applicant entity must complete the General Digital Transformation Assessment on the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's Manufacturing Digital Transformation Comprehensive Information Service Platform (szgx.miit.gov.cn/zzyszh/home) or the Guangdong Provincial Manufacturing Digital Transformation Public Service Platform (gdmdtp.com), and provide screenshots of the assessment results or a self-assessment report.
Second, through digital tools, enable the integrated application of data and production and manufacturing systems and business collaboration in at least 3 key stages, including R&D and design, production and manufacturing, warehousing, and supply chain management.
Article 2 is not a checkbox question. In the application form (Attachment 1), you must check off each item in the information system list (enterprise resource planning, warehousing, supply chain, procurement, production execution, quality, R&D design, sales, equipment management, etc.), and also fill in the degree of "system integration" and the number of integrated systems, and check the covered modules by system, such as ERP, MES/MOM, QMS, SCM, CRM, BI, etc. The last column, "Project Implementation Effects," requires separately filling in the actual levels before and after implementation, in three categories: technological advancement, economic benefits, and social benefits.
The special materials also follow this logic: the expense breakdown statement (in Appendix 2, fill in item by item the contract name, Party B, signing and execution dates, amount, and corresponding delivery acceptance certificates), procurement contract, payment vouchers, invoices, implementation effect pictures (system screenshots), and general evaluation certificates; the basic materials additionally require audit reports for the past 3 years, social security participation materials, and 2025 tax payment status.
In other words, what the review looks at is not “what software was purchased,” but “in which stages this software is actually up and running, and whether the money and acceptance match up.”
What needs to be changed at the customer site is the contracts, documents, and screenshot habits
For our project working with Odoo 19 CE + OCA, this policy translates into three very specific tasks.
First, itemize contracts and invoices. List prices and issue invoices separately for the modules integrated with the manufacturing production system (MRP, inventory, procurement, quality inspection, equipment management) and for finance, OA, and cloud subscriptions. Under a multi-company structure, this should have been split this way in the first place; different legal entities use different modules, so only then is cost attribution clear. Contracts already signed in 2025 cannot be changed, but in the expense breakdown table, at least fill in the includible and non-includible amounts separately; do not put the entire package amount into the base.
Second, four-way document alignment. The expense breakdown statement requires 'corresponding delivery acceptance evidence'; on the Odoo side, this means linking the purchase order (purchase.order), vendor bill (account.move), payment (account.payment), and project deliverables (project.task and its attachments, UAT sign-off, go-live confirmation, acceptance report) under the same contract number. The guide specifically requires that the payment date fall within 2025, so the payment date field cannot be changed afterward—we generally advise clients to complete this reconciliation before closing the books for 2025.
Third, integrated evidence traceability. "At least 3 key stages" must be able to produce verifiable screenshots in Odoo: sales order to production (sale.order → mrp.production), production material issue (stock.move), and purchase receipt and quality inspection (purchase.order → stock.picking → quality.check). The X in "partially integrated X items" in the application form should come from the actual document flow list. The same applies to before-and-after implementation levels—output per capita, inventory turnover days, and on-time order delivery rate must come from system reports; they cannot be made up by clerks the week before application.
There is a pitfall here: during go-live everyone is busy verifying functionality, so the 'pre-transformation baseline data' is rarely formally archived. Two years later, when filling in the 'actual pre-implementation level,' people can only dig through old Excel files, and the definitions still do not match. Now we attach a one-page baseline metric snapshot to the go-live confirmation form—something we learned from this type of filing.
One more reminder on timing: online filing is from November 9 to November 20, 2026, 17:30; paper materials are from November 9 to November 25, 17:30, and should be submitted to Window 19, District Administrative Service Center, First Floor, Guangming District Public Service Platform. The guidelines state that 'paper materials may only be submitted after passing the online preliminary review' and 'only projects whose paper materials have been successfully submitted are considered to have completed the application'; intermediaries are strictly prohibited, and no fees are charged.
Two deadlines — let's work backwards from them
Before November 13, reclassify 2025 software investments once according to the guideline criteria. Judgment conditions: whether the payment date falls within 2025-01-01 to 2025-12-31, whether the contract was signed no earlier than 2022-01-01, and whether the invoice date is no later than the declaration time. The action is to pull all relevant contracts and invoices, mark each item as “eligible / ineligible”, cross out financial management systems, OA, website construction, e-commerce software, software legalization, drawing and design software, cloud leasing, and equipment-embedded software, derive an eligible base, then multiply by 30% to see whether it reaches the upper limit of RMB 2 million. If the base is zero, do not proceed further.
Complete the two prerequisite proofs by November 18. Determination criterion: whether the general digital transformation assessment has been completed on the MIIT or Guangdong Province platform—if not, do it this week and save screenshots of the results or the self-assessment report. At the same time, organize evidence for 'at least 3 key stages' according to the application form format: list the document flow paths that have actually been connected (for example, sales order → production → material requisition → purchase arrival → quality inspection), save system screenshots and a list of integration counts; do not just write textual descriptions.
Complete the online filing by 17:30 on November 20, and complete the paper submission by 17:30 on November 25. Judgment condition: whether the electronic materials pass the preliminary review (if they do not pass, first revise them according to the return comments, then resubmit before the paper deadline). The action is to fill out the application form online on the Shenzhen Municipal Unified Management Platform for Special Fiscal Funds (Caiqitong), and upload the remaining materials as PDFs; after passing the preliminary review, export the full set of materials with watermark and serial number, stamp each page, add a seam seal for multiple pages, number the pages consecutively, glue-bind them into a volume, and deliver one copy to Window 19. The consultation telephone guide provides 0755-88219721 and 0755-88212832.
Record the two deadlines as two reminders; don't set just one.
—— Basis: the notice dated 2026-11-05 on Guangming District Government Online and Attachment 2, the application guidelines, application form, and cost breakdown table. Amounts, exclusion scope, and timing are quoted from the original text of the official website attachments. Third-party platforms label it “2026,” while the official website labels it “2025”; this article follows the official website. The example calculation is for illustrative purposes only and is not the actual application data of any enterprise.
