R&D Credit and Cost Capitalization

I have a client who has had an R&D study performed by a 3rd party organization for the past several years and claimed a substantial R&D credit each year. They had a bad year in 2022 and decided not to have the study done since the business had a loss. I brought up the fact that R&D (R&E) costs are now required to be capitalized and amortized over 5 years so we should try to determine what costs are R&D related and make an adjustment for these costs, which would change their loss to a large profit if their R&D expenses are similar to prior years. The client responded and said the expenses that qualified them for the credit in the past are "Technical improvements and development for a specific customer scope of work". An example of what they do is a customer could be in manufacturing and need a conveyor system to fit into a specific area of their factor and my client would design and build that system for them. I'm not concerned about the credit at this point but I don't know the specific details of the new R&D capitalization to determine if that type of work needs to be capitalized. I would greatly appreciate it if anyone could point me in the right direction.