On 8 April 2025 the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology issued its 2025 action plan to support information software companies in strengthening AI application service capability (Jing Jing Xin Fa [2025] No. 19). The plan’s subject is information software companies, that is, the companies that package AI capability into products and services for others.
Eight measures and three classes of recipient
The plan sets out eight measures, and the recipients fall broadly into three classes: MaaS platforms that supply compute and model services, application companies developing industry models and agents, and contributors to the open-source ecosystem.
Among them, MaaS platforms reaching a certain service scale receive compute voucher support, with up to RMB 30 million against compute deployment cost; the non-hardware portion of procurement in a solution receives a reward of up to RMB 30 million; a general-purpose agent that has obtained a generative AI product and service launch number and is listed for the first time receives support of up to RMB 30 million; and qualifying shared open-source AI projects receive a reward of up to RMB 2 million.
The logic of the compute voucher
A compute voucher is a design that converts fiscal funds into spending power for compute. Unlike a direct procurement subsidy, it gives a company a disposable compute allowance and then lets it choose its own supplier. That reduces lock-in to a particular supplier and directs the money to the point of actual use.
See Shanghai’s AI application subsidy, which likewise covers compute, models and corpora but places more weight on the overall investment in an application scenario.
The launch number is written into the conditions
The plan makes obtaining a generative AI product and service launch number one of the conditions for a general-purpose agent to receive support. The design is worth noting: it ties compliance credentials to funding, which means filing and registration stop being merely a compliance cost and become a threshold for accessing policy resources.
See our notes on the difference between large model filing and large model registration and on algorithm filing.
What companies should do
First, check whether the company falls within the supported categories. MaaS platforms, industry models, agents and open-source projects each correspond to a different application route.
Second, build compliance credentials into the funding plan. See Beijing’s plan for AI-enabled industrial modernisation; municipal and district-level policies are converging in their requirements on credentials.
Third, mind the evidentiary requirements for post-hoc rewards. Support paid after the fact normally requires proof of actual investment, so invoices and records for procurement and research should be kept in order in advance. See our notes on generative AI filing and registration.
The direction of policy support is shifting from building large models to turning models into services that can be sold.
This article is based on the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology’s 2025 action plan for software firms’ AI application capability and public information and is for reference only; it does not constitute legal advice.