Relaxation of technology programme to is to facilitate early adoption of tech.
Hong Kong’s Innovation and Technology Commission has relaxed the requirements for the Government’s Technology Voucher Programme (TVP).
The aim of the relaxation is to facilitate a business applicants’ early adoption of relevant technological services or solutions for improving its business operation and enhancing competitiveness.
Under the new arrangement, applicants may choose to commence their projects while their applications are still under vetting and start their projects on the day following the submission of the application at the earliest.
The TVP aims to subsidise local enterprises and organisations to use technology to improve productivity, or upgrade or transform their business processes.
To facilitate the early adoption of the relevant technological services or solutions by applicants, with effect from the start of June 2020.
Although the ITC will relax the requirement for Technology Voucher Programme, applicants must obtain approval from the ITC before commencement of the projects.
The Commission stated applicants should note “they will have to bear the full costs of their projects themselves if their applications are subsequently not approved”.
Once approved applicants can start their projects on the day following the submission of the application at the earliest.
An applicant who commences its project while the application is under processing must submit a duly completed, “Declaration and Undertaking”to the ITC no later than five working days after the actual commencement date of the project.
The Commission also announced the period for the IT Service Providers Reference List of the Distance Business Programme will end the first week of June 2020.
Service providers wishing to enrol for the Reference List should submit applications through the Programme’s online system before the deadline.
“The Programme opened for enterprises to apply for funding on May 18. As at [30 May] the Programme had received an overwhelming response of 8 017 funding applications from enterprises. In order to focus resources on processing these applications and enable the enterprises to benefit early, we need to cease accepting applications from service providers to enrol for the Reference List at an appropriate time,” a spokesman for the Commission said.
The Reference List seeks to offer relevant market information merely for reference by enterprises applying for funding. Whether or not the enterprises engage service providers on the Reference List will not affect the outcome of the application.
The aim of the Distance Business Programme is to provide funding support through fast-track processing for enterprises to adopt IT solutions during the epidemic for developing distance business, so as to continue their business and services.
