5). Accreditation System for Software Enterprises

　　a. Accreditation standards for software enterprises shall be formulated by the Ministry of Information Industry, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the State Bureau of Taxation and other related departments.

　　b. Annual assessment system shall be carried out among software enterprises. Enterprises that fail to pass annual assessment will be deprived of their identities as software enterprises and can no longer enjoy related preferential policies.

　　c. The Ministry of Information Industry and the State Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision shall be responsible for the formulation of national standards of software products.


　　6). Protection of Intellectual Property Rights

　　a. The registration of software copyrights is encouraged and key protection is given to registered software in accordance with the state laws.

　　b. No unit is allowed to use unauthorized software products in its computer system.

　　c. Crackdown on software smuggling and pirating shall be strengthened, and making, production and selling of pirated software shall be punished severely.


　　Integrated Circuits (IC) Industry

　　1). Foreign and domestic enterprises are encouraged to establish jointly invested or wholly foreign-invested IC production enterprises. For average tax payers selling IC products (including monocrystalline silicon chips) made by themselves, before 2010 value-added tax will be collected in line with the tax rate of 17 percent, as set by law. Practically, except for the part of 6 percent, other part of the tax will be reimbursed immediately after collection for the enterprises to use in research and development of new integrated circuits and reproduction expansion.

　　2). Preferential tax policies that encourage foreign investment in energy and communications industries will be adopted for IC manufacturers whose amount of investment exceeds 8 billion yuan or whose IC wire width is less than 0.25 µ m.

　　3). Self-use raw material and consumption goods for production imported by manufacturers whose amount of investment exceeds 8 billion yuan or whose IC wire width is less than 0.25 µ m shall be exempted from tariffs and import-stage value-added tax. The Customs shall provide clearance convenience for such enterprises.

　　4). Enterprises whose amount of investment exceeds 8 billion yuan or whose IC wire width is less than 0.25 µ m are permitted to deposit their after-tax profit intended for reinvestment within the territory of the People‘s Republic of China in a special account in the form of foreign currencies. These deposits are subject to the supervision of the foreign exchange administration department.

　　5). The minimum depreciation period for production equipment of IC manufacturers is three years.

　　6). IC technology and complete sets of production equipment imported by IC manufacturers and special IC equipment and apparatus imported as separate items shall be exempted, in accordance with relevant regulations, from import tariffs and import-stage value-added tax.

　　7). Chips of integrated circuits designed by domestic IC designing enterprises can be manufactured abroad if they cannot be manufactured domestically. After the processing contract (including specifications and amounts) is approved by the department in charge, tariffs shall be levied according to the interim preferential tax rate for their import.

　　8). The examination and ratification department in charge of IC projects is responsible for recognizing IC enterprises after soliciting opinions from the taxation department at the same level.

　　9). IC designs are regarded as software products and enjoy the protection of laws concerning intellectual property rights. The state encourages the evaluation and registration of IC designs.


　　10). IC designing is regarded as software industry and enjoys policies concerning software industry.