This article is written by Riley Kaminer, associate at StateUp and Toluwanimi Segun, fellow at StateUp

The pandemic has accelerated digitalisation — in the public sector too. While technology won’t fix complex public policy issues, an important dialogue is opening up between start-ups and governments.

Start-ups, and the technologies they’ve developed, have shaped many aspects of our personal and professional lives during the pandemic. Gaming companies’ sales have skyrocketed as they’ve kept us occupied. Online retailers have delivered groceries to our doorsteps. EdTech start-ups have allowed schooling to continue as children stay home — the list goes on.

Governments have also had to respond to new demand for innovative services. Public servants have had to shift to remote work by default. Doctors’ surgeries have turned to telemedicine. Digital supply chain management has become a basic public necessity.

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Here as well, start-ups have stepped up to the mark, their operational agility allowing them to respond quickly to these changing circumstances.

At StateUp, we’ve examined dozens of start-ups working with public sector organisations, from public safety bodies to public utilities companies. Each company we considered in our StateUp 21 report is combining innovative technology with an understanding of policy to address both emergent and longstanding public sector needs.

Start-ups may not have the answer to every policy problem. But there are clear patterns emerging across policy domains and geographies around the kinds of needs that they can help to address. Here are five ways in which public servants can benefit from GovTech, both during the pandemic, and as it begins to recede.

1. GovTech helps public servants deliver services remotely

During the pandemic, it has been essential for public servants to deliver services remotely. Start-ups have helped smooth the transition from physical service delivery.

At the start of the pandemic, UK start-up AccuRx helped almost 75% of local doctors provide video consultations in a matter of days. Delivering remote services also shows promise for improving outcomes beyond the pandemic response. For example, the Healthy.io smartphone app measures albumin levels in patients’ urine, essential to detecting chronic kidney disease. Patients download the app and use the test kit, and healthcare providers receive results through the cloud. Innovations like these help limit the numbers of patients who require in-person care, which may reduce pressure on frontline staff.

2. Start-ups provide comprehensive tools for public servants dealing with emergent policy issues

The start-ups we’ve mentioned so far are adjusting established services. But other start-ups are helping to create services that tackle new and emerging policy issues for the first time.

False online information spread so much during the pandemic that the WHO declared a concurrent ‘infodemic’. UK and India-based Logically helps identify both false information and fake images in online content. This has supported federal and state governments in India with, for example, spotting and discrediting pandemic-related announcements falsely purporting to be from the government. Fake news spreads fast, so quickly identifying false information is essential to an effective response.

3. GovTech can help increase trust in public institutions

As governments rapidly digitalise in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, citizens are taking notice of the benefits, but also the shortfalls. Trust is essential if citizens are to adopt genuinely beneficial technologies.

The most impressive GovTech start-ups have taken particular care to foster trust in government. For instance, Privitar helps public sector organisations to realise the value of sensitive data through data privacy software. This de-identifies data, minimises risk, and achieves regulatory compliance. The UK’s National Health Service used Privitar’s technology to collate and anonymise data from the hundreds of individual trusts that make it up. This made all of its data accessible to researchers while protecting citizens’ identities.

4. Public servants can create deeper, more meaningful connections with citizens using digital tools

As we’ve maintained physical distance to prevent the spread of Covid-19, public sector organisations including legislative bodies have looked to digital tools to understand what the public is thinking and feeling.

Public servants who know where to look are spoiled for choice. Companies such as Belgium’s CitizenLab and Israel’s Insights.US use natural language processing (NLP) to sort citizens’ responses to public inquiries on their engagement platform. This technology automatically groups responses into categories, allowing civil servants to more easily interpret citizens’ viewpoints.

Other companies take a sector-specific approach. For example, British start-up Commonplace focuses on the built environment, helping to ensure that constituents have a voice in local planning. Its online platform solicits views and shares information between citizens, builders, and city councils. This promotes inclusive decision-making processes without the need for in-person meetings.

5. GovTech can augment the operational capacity of public services and public servants

Many GovTech firms have promoted resilience through uncertainty by helping public servants to more effectively undertake their daily tasks. For example, Cyan Forensics in the UK helps police to scan devices for harmful content in the field without the need for a forensics lab. This enables first responders to more quickly and cheaply identify and reduce criminal activity in their community.

US-based Remix helps public officials map and analyse public transportation routes through an easy-to-use online dashboard. These tools came into use during the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, when cities needed to shift public transportation routes and traffic patterns virtually overnight.

GovTech isn’t about technological fixes

When it comes to complex governance issues, technology alone cannot save the day. But technology can provide policy-makers with powerful tools when chosen carefully and implemented well. It can help us imagine new ways out of thorny public sector challenges.

The best GovTech start-ups recognise this. They understand the limitations of technological ‘fixes’ in addressing major societal and public policy challenges.

In our experience, the best GovTech start-ups are eager to hear from public servants about the challenges they face, and to think carefully about what their technology can offer. This dialogue can help to cut through the hype that surrounds some technologies, which, in turn, clears the way for genuinely useful innovations to improve how governments work and serve their citizens. — Riley Kaminer and Toluwanimi Segun

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