Circular 13/2020/TT-BTTTT defines the activities of software product manufacturing.

CIRCULARS

REGULATIONS FOR DETERMINING WHETHER SOFTWARE PRODUCTION ACTIVITIES MEET PROCEDURES

Based on the Law on Information Technology dated June 29, 2006;

Based on Government Decree No. 71/2007/ND-CP dated May 3, 2007, which provides detailed regulations and guidance on the implementation of several articles of the Law on Information Technology concerning the information technology industry;

Based on Decree No. 17/2017/ND-CP dated October 17, 2017 of the Government stipulating the functions, tasks, powers and organizational structure of the Ministry of Information and Communications;

Based on Decree No. 218/2013/ND-CP dated December 26, 2013 of the Government detailing and guiding the implementation of the Corporate Income Tax Law;

As requested by the Director of the Information Technology Department,

The Minister of Information and Communications issued a Circular stipulating the procedures for determining whether software product manufacturing activities meet the required processes.

Article 1. Scope

This circular stipulates the procedures for determining whether software product manufacturing activities meet the requirements to qualify for corporate income tax incentives.

Article 2. Subject of application

This Circular applies to management agencies, organizations, and businesses involved in the production of software products listed in the Software Product Catalog as prescribed by the Ministry of Information and Communications.

Article 3. Software Product Manufacturing Process

The stages in the software product manufacturing process:

1. Defining requirements, including one or more tasks such as: generating or refining ideas for software product development; describing product characteristics (requirements) and product use contexts; proposing, surveying, and clarifying requirements for the software product; business analysis; building complete requirements for the software product; advising on process adjustments; agreeing on requirements, reviewing requirements, assessing control capabilities, and establishing the basis for verifying product compliance.

2. Analysis and design, including one or more tasks such as: requirements specification (functional and non-functional requirements, problems to be solved); problem formulation; appropriate techniques to optimize the solution; software correctness and testability analysis; analysis of the impact of software requirements on the operating environment; prioritized, approved, and updated requirements; data modeling; functional modeling; information flow modeling; software solution identification; solution design; software system design; data design; software architecture design; design of software units and modules; software security and information safety design; customer experience interface design.

3. Programming, writing code, including one or more tasks such as: writing software programs; programming software units and modules; editing, customizing, and fine-tuning software; integrating software units; integrating software systems.

4. Software testing and verification, including one or more tasks such as: building test scenarios, testing software units and modules; software testing; software system testing; software functional testing; software quality assessment; error assessment; software security and information safety testing; determining customer satisfaction; and software acceptance.

5. Completing and packaging the software product includes one or more tasks such as: creating software product descriptions, installation guides (in the case of a complete product delivery), software user manuals (for users or service tenants); packaging the software product; registering the design; registering intellectual property rights.

6. Installation, transfer, user instruction, maintenance, and warranty of software products include one or more operations such as: transfer (full product package or product usage rights in the form of leasing); instruction on software product installation (in the case of full product transfer); deployment and installation of software products (on the customer's system in the case of full product transfer or on the service provider's system in the case of software product leasing); training and instruction (for users or service tenants); testing of software products after transfer or on the service provider's system; fixing software product errors after transfer or on the service provider's system; post-transfer support during the service leasing period; product warranty after transfer or during the service leasing period; software product maintenance (on the customer's system or on the service provider's system).

7. Software product publishing and distribution, including one or more activities such as selling, leasing, distributing, and publishing self-produced software products.

Article 4. Determining whether software product manufacturing activities meet the process requirements.

1. The production of a software product by an organization or enterprise as stipulated in Article 3 of this Circular is considered to be a software product production activity that meets the process requirements when, for that product, the organization or enterprise performs at least one of the two stages: Requirements definition, Analysis and design as stipulated in Clauses 1 and 2 of Article 3 of this Circular.

2. Software product manufacturing activities that meet the procedures stipulated in Clause 1 of this Article shall be demonstrated by one or more of the following documents, corresponding to each operation within the stages performed by the organization or enterprise:

a) Documentation proving each operation of the Requirements Definition stage: Description of the product development methodology; description of product characteristics (requirements), product usage contexts; description of proposals, survey results, clarification results, and requirements refinement for the product; detailed business analysis description; description of the completed product requirements; description of process adjustment consultation content; minutes of requirements agreement, requirements review, description of controllability and basis for confirming product compliance with requirements; or documents with similar content.

b) Documentation demonstrating each operation of the Analysis and Design phase: Description of requirements; description of the development problem; description of appropriate techniques implemented to optimize the solution; analysis of the software's correctness and testability; analysis of the impact of software requirements on the operating environment; list of prioritized, approved, and updated requirements; description of data models, functional models, and information flow models; description of the software solution; solution design, software system design, data design, architectural design, design of software units and component modules; security and information safety design for the software; customer experience interface design; or documents with similar content.

c) Documentation proving the operational aspects of the Programming and Code Writing process: Several key source code snippets demonstrating that the company wrote the software code; descriptions of the integrated software system; or documents with similar content.

d) Documentation proving each operation of the software testing and verification process: Test and verification scenarios for software units and modules; descriptions of software test results, software system test results, software functional test results, software quality assessment results; descriptions of error potential assessments; descriptions of security and information safety test results for the software; confirmation that the software meets customer requirements; software acceptance reports; or documents with similar content.

d) Documentation proving each operation of the product completion and packaging stage: A full introduction to the software product; installation instructions (in the case of a complete product delivery package), instructions for using the product or service (for users or service tenants); a copy of the design registration certificate (if any); a copy of the intellectual property registration certificate (if any); or documents with similar content.

e) Documentation proving each operation of the Installation, Transfer, User Training, Warranty, and Maintenance stages of the product: Minutes or contract of transfer (for the entire product or the right to use the product in the form of a lease); instructions for installing the software product (in the case of a complete product transfer); description of the results of installing the software product (on the customer's system in the case of a complete transfer or on the service provider's system in the case of a software product lease); training and instruction content (for the user or service lessee); description of software product testing activities after handover or software product testing on the service provider's system; description of software product debugging activities after handover or software product testing on the service provider's system; description of post-handover support activities during the service lease; description of product warranty activities after handover or during the service lease; Describes software product maintenance activities (on customer systems or on service provider systems).

Article 5. Implementation

1. The Information Technology Department is responsible for:

a) Implement this Circular.

b) To compile relevant information from organizations and businesses as stipulated in point b, Clause 2 of this Article to serve the work of state management.

2. Organizations and businesses participating in the production of software products as stipulated in this Circular are responsible for:

a) Take full responsibility for the accuracy of the information in the application for tax incentives for software production activities and determine whether the software production activities meet the required procedures.

b) Submit and update information on software products and stages in the software product manufacturing process that meet the required procedures and deductible tax rates to the Ministry of Information and Communications (Information Technology Department) for compilation.

c) Ensure that its software product manufacturing activities and software products do not violate intellectual property laws and other relevant legal regulations.

Article 6. Transitional provisions

Software production activities that were determined to meet the prescribed procedures before the effective date of this Circular shall continue to be considered as meeting the software production procedures until the end of the approved investment project period.

Article 7. Terms enforcement

1. This Circular shall take effect from January 1, 2020.

2. This Circular replaces Circular No. 16/2014/TT-BTTTT dated November 18, 2014 of the Ministry of Information and Communications regulating the determination of software production activities.

3. During the implementation process, if any difficulties arise, organizations and businesses should send written documents to the Ministry of Information and Communications (Information Technology Department) for processing, resolution, guidance, or appropriate amendments and additions.

4. The Chief of Office, the Director of the Information Technology Department, the heads of agencies and units under the Ministry of Information and Communications, the Directors of the Departments of Information and Communications of provinces and centrally-administered cities, and organizations and enterprises are responsible for implementing this Circular./.