Our Innovation Analysts recently looked into emerging technologies and up-and-coming startups working on innovative solutions for smart cities. As there is a large number of startups working on a wide variety of solutions, we want to share our insights with you. This time, you will discover 5 promising GovTech startups.
Heat Map: 5 Top GovTech Startups
Using the StartUs Insights Discovery Platform, covering 1.379.000+ startups & scaleups globally, we looked at innovation in the field of smart cities. For this research, we identified 264 relevant solutions and picked 5 to showcase below. These companies were chosen based on a data-driven startup scouting approach, taking into account factors such as location, founding year, and relevance of technology, among others. Depending on your specific criteria, the top picks might look entirely different.
The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights 5 startups & scaleups developing innovative GovTech solutions. Moreover, the Heat Map reveals regions that observe a high startup activity and illustrates the geographic distribution of all 264 companies we analyzed for this specific topic.
Click to download
ProudCity – Digital Government
As government departments embrace digitization, they now offer access to many of their services online. Startups help authorities build a secure and transparent online presence to encourage higher public participation. This reduces the burden on physical offices and gives citizens a convenient way to file their applications, grievances, or requests.
ProudCity is a US-based startup developing digital government services for municipalities. The startup builds websites and other online tools for local governments. For these services, the startup integrates forms, payment gateways, meeting tools, service centers, and other features in their offerings. ProudCity’s solutions are accessible, mobile-friendly, and open-source.
Novoville – Citizen Engagement
Local authorities benefit from citizen engagement by identifying the key demands and pain points of citizens in any area. Surveys and town hall meetings serve this purpose but only include a sample of the constituents. To overcome this challenge, GovTech startups support governments to reach a larger number of people for more effective citizen engagement. This allows for near real-time feedback, allowing authorities to serve people better.
British startup Novoville builds an eponymous citizen engagement platform. The modular, cloud-based platform acts as an e-Frontdesk, helping local authorities with certificate and permit request management. By enabling multi-channel communication, Novoville makes interactions between local governments and citizens more immediate, efficient, and cost-effective. Moreover, in wake of the coronavirus pandemic, the startup’s solution aids councils and organizations in better managing their resources. For example, the platform enables efficient mobilization, triage, and assignment for a timely and inclusive response.
MicroTraffic – Road Safety
Traffic jams and accidents are a universal problem for countries across the world. However, ensuring road safety is a function that largely falls on local governments within the city limits. Tech-driven analytics solutions determine road junctions that are more prone to accidents and thus support government authorities to implement appropriate safety measures. Moreover, road and pedestrian data help traffic departments analyze the efficacy of different initiatives on road safety.
Canadian startup MicroTraffic provides video analytics for road safety. The startup’s Conflict Reports collect high-resolution near-miss incidents data to diagnose risk and study the safety of roads. This enables planners to quantify the impact of traffic interventions, such as improving the mass transit system. Afterward, the solution analyzes any incidents, reports their frequency, and severity to inform safety improvement plans.
Viselio – Automated Online Visa Application
Citizens often need to fill long and complicated forms to obtain permissions or licenses. For instance, visa applications are often delayed due to improper paperwork or delay in the verification of documents. GovTech startups develop solutions that make the process smoother for both the authorities and citizens. These e-government solutions usually incorporate digital identities and biometric authentication for verification.
Swiss startup Viselio offers a fully automated online visa application platform. The solution asks for detailed application information, the required documents, as well as any questions particular to the visa process for the destination country. Viselio delivers paper visas, e-visas, and biometric visas in a timely manner. The service is currently available in some European countries, including the UK, France, Switzerland, and Austria.
CoProcure – Public Procurement
A major portion of government budgets goes towards the public procurement of goods and services. Therefore, it is imperative that the process is as optimized and transparent as possible to reduce the amount of money misspent due to inefficient mechanisms and delayed communication. GovTech startups are addressing these issues by connecting suppliers and public agencies. Moreover, integrating purchasing across different agencies into a single, centralized platform allows governments to make better buying decisions.
CoProcure is a US-based startup developing a purchasing platform for public departments. The solution allows public agencies to discover relevant suppliers, compare different purchasing methods, and overview the purchasing experience of other public agencies. Conversely, the platform enables suppliers to make it easier for government buyers to find them. Overall, the platform reduces the cost of buying in local governments while leveling the playing field for businesses.
What about the other 259 solutions?
While we believe data is key to creating insights it can be easy to be overwhelmed by it. Our ambition is to create a comprehensive overview and provide actionable innovation intelligence and enable you to achieve your goals faster. The 5 GovTech startups showcased above are promising examples out of the 264 we analyzed for this article. To identify the most relevant solutions based on your specific criteria, get in touch.
