Hong Kong
The Technology Voucher Programme closed at the end of 2024, and most of the advice online has not caught up. Here is what a Hong Kong business can actually apply for now — and, honestly, where custom software does not fit.
Checked 12 August 2026 against the Innovation and Technology Commission, the Trade and Industry Department and Cyberport. Scheme rules change — confirm anything decision-critical with the scheme itself before you rely on it.
Technology Voucher Programme
If you have been told a technology project can be 75% funded up to HK$600,000, that advice is out of date.
The Innovation and Technology Commission announced in December 2024 that TVP would cease accepting new applications after 31 December 2024, on the view that the programme had achieved its original intent. Over its lifetime it approved tens of thousands of applications worth billions of Hong Kong dollars, so it left a very large trail of guides, agency landing pages and blog posts behind it.
Almost none of those pages were updated. That is why a business researching this in 2026 still finds confident, detailed instructions for applying to a scheme that no longer accepts applicants — often from consultants who charge to prepare the application.
There is no direct replacement. The Government's stated position is that individual policy bureaux and departments now run more targeted schemes for the needs of particular industries, rather than one general voucher open to everyone.
Still running
Two schemes come up most often for technology work. Neither is a general-purpose replacement for TVP, and the detail matters more than the headline number.
BUD Fund
Run by the Trade and Industry Department. The larger of the two by a wide margin, but aimed at market expansion rather than internal systems.
Source: Trade and Industry Department.
DTSPP
Run by Cyberport. Small, deliberately narrow, and structured in a way that rules out bespoke work by design.
Source: DTSPP portal, Cyberport.
The honest part
We build custom systems for a living, so this is not a comfortable thing for us to publish. It is still true.
DTSPP funds packages from a pre-assessed Solution List. Software built specifically for your business cannot be on a list of pre-assessed products — that is what "custom" means. So bespoke work is outside that scheme structurally, not by oversight.
BUD can cover upgrading and restructuring work, and a system that genuinely serves expansion into one of the covered economies may fit. But it funds a quarter of the cost, it is assessed against a market-development case rather than an efficiency one, and building an expansion story around a project that is really about internal operations is the kind of stretch that wastes months and then fails assessment.
The practical consequence: plan a custom build as something you fund yourself. If a subsidy turns out to apply, treat it as a rebate rather than as the thing that makes the project viable. Projects whose business case only works with a grant tend to be projects whose business case does not work.
Before paying anyone to prepare an application, talk to SME ReachOut. It is run by the Hong Kong Productivity Council, it gives free one-to-one consultations to help a business work out which schemes it actually qualifies for, and it is not selling anything. That makes it a better first stop than any vendor — including us.
Two things worth checking about anyone who offers to handle a funding application for you: whether their fee depends on the grant being approved, and whether the scheme they are describing is still open. The volume of TVP material still circulating in 2026 makes the second question more useful than it sounds.
Before you pay anyone
There is a free government service for exactly this question.
Questions
No. The Innovation and Technology Commission announced in December 2024 that the Technology Voucher Programme would stop accepting new applications after 31 December 2024, on the view that it had achieved its original intent. A great deal of advice online still describes TVP as open, because it ran for eight years and those pages were never updated.
Nothing directly. The Government's stated position is that individual policy bureaux and departments now run more targeted schemes aimed at particular industries, rather than one general technology voucher open to every sector.
Usually not, and it is worth knowing that before you plan around it. The Digital Transformation Support Pilot Programme only funds pre-assessed packages from its published Solution List, which by definition excludes something built for your business. The BUD Fund can cover upgrading work, but it is aimed at branding, upgrading and expansion into specific external markets rather than internal systems, and it funds a quarter of the cost.
The ratio was adjusted in March 2025 to 1 (Government) : 3 (enterprise) — the Government funds up to a quarter of approved project cost, and the enterprise contributes the remaining three quarters. The cumulative ceiling is HK$7 million per enterprise across a maximum of 70 approved projects.
SME ReachOut, run by the Hong Kong Productivity Council, gives free one-to-one consultations to help a business identify which schemes it qualifies for. It is government-funded and sells nothing, which makes it a better first stop than any vendor — including us.
Related
What bespoke work costs, how long it takes, and when buying a product is the better answer.
Often the cheapest real saving available, and it rarely needs a grant to justify itself.
Making the tools you already pay for agree with each other.
A costed, sequenced roadmap — including an explicit list of what not to build.
We are not funding consultants and we will not prepare an application for you. What we can do is tell you honestly what a system would cost to build and to run, so you can judge the case on its own merits.