We are a worldwide network of public, private and third sector organisations working across Civic and GovTech sectors, supporting and nurturing an ecosystem developing products and services which make citizens’ lives better.

Our mission is to empower global GovTech and Civic Tech innovation programmes to deliver better outcomes for people and communities, helping navigate, promote challenge-based methodologies and give governments the confidence to adopt new methods of engagement, procurement and technology adoption. 

Welcome to the CivTech Alliance!

We are a global network of like-minded GovTech and Civic Tech programmes comprising governments, enterprise agencies, academic and not-for-profit institutions across 17 countries.

The CivTech Alliance's mission is straightforward: it exists to share best practices among its international network on how to deliver government transformation and find solutions to some of the world’s problems through technology and innovation.

Read more to find out how to get involved in this award-winning internationally recognised network.

The CivTech Alliance Overview

Formed in Scotland, and with members stretching from Washington D.C. to South Australia, The GovTech Global Alliance was set up as an in-depth resource for practitioners and academics in the Civic and GovTech space. The golden thread that runs through our membership is the drive to make people's lives better.

International recognition

We are delighted to have received international recognition for our work on climate change, cross-border collaboration, and innovation diplomacy.

For the fourth year in a row, Apolitical celebrated innovative, ground-breaking teams that are changing the game through their Global Public Service Team of the Year Awards.

The ‘Climate Heroes’ category recognised public service teams who are working to make a greener, more sustainable future for themselves and their communities.

We were delighted to win this after the initial shortlisting and then public vote.

See the presentation on Innovation Diplomacy liv eon stage in Berlin on 2nd June Creative Bureaucracy Live Presentation

OECD-OPSI report on Delivering and Enabling Impactful Cross-Border Solutions (March 2022)

It sets out some of the key examples of how governments are collaborating on innovative approaches to collectively deliver genuinely impactful cross-border solutions. Importantly, the report provides recommendations for governments to drive the evolution of public sector innovation globally.

The GSUP 1.0 is one of the report’s case studies on pg. 15.

Main stage session Creative Bureaucracy Festival, Berlin (June 22)

From nearly 200 applications, the CivTech Alliance was one of three presenters on the main stage of the The Creative Bureaucracy Festival world’s largest festival for public sector innovation. Berlin 2 June.

Our session was on Innovation Diplomacy.

Video footage will be available shortly

Innovation diplomacy - Holyrood Magazine (Dec 21)

This article lays out what innovation diplomacy is and why it will become increasingly significant for smaller countries such as Scotland. The type of international diplomacy we’re all familiar with, managing relationships between governments, often takes the form of aid or trade. Innovation diplomacy is different in that it uses new ideas and technology to build relations between governments, with a focus on delivering shared policy outcomes or better public services. Read more about Innovation Diplomacy in this piece written by CivTech Alliance Founder, Alexander Holt (Scottish Government)

Ways to engage and benefits of participation

For Programme teams

People join the GovTech Global Alliance because the challenge of progressing government is not an easy one. Many of our members are at the vanguard of public sector and civic innovation as they push the boundaries in working practices and cross-sector collaboration.

There are three increasing levels of engagement:

  1.  The weekly video meetings

  2. Global Scale-Up Participation

  3. Bilateral challenges

Weekly video meetings

Our weekly video calls started as pandemic lockdowns were implemented, where we shared our respective governments’ response to the pandemic and our role within that. These have led on to Ministerial participation in subsequent GovTech Summits and Demo Days. We continue to run calls taking into account different time zones and alternating every fortnight:

  • Wednesdays 3pm BST - US/South America/EUR/ME  

  • Thursdays 8am BST - EUR/ME/Australia/NZ

These calls are an opportunity to update the teams on latest developments and run for 75minutes. These are deliberately ran fortnightly so you have a chance to get to know the other members - from knowledge, comes trust, which leads to opportunities but also friendships! For some, these calls are about sharing best practice, for others they are ‘therapy sessions’ for those trying to change government!

 

The Global Scale-Up Programme (GSUP)

GSUP is an access programme that brings together participating Alliance members and up to twenty innovative companies from around the world to address climate challenges. Companies are selected from regions and join a global cohort participating in an on-line ‘Scale-Up Safari’. This is a series of engagement sessions with policymakers and procurers, innovators and investors from each regional entrepreneurial ecosystem, rotating through each country for 2-3 days. The purpose is to provide access to public sector and ecosystem decision makers, they would not otherwise know how to access. It ends with a showcase demo day/week of the companies’ challenge solutions. The final phase is field testing, where the country programme teams are on hand to support the companies further develop their connections to win contracts.

The engagement from teams is more intense, helping to promote the programme, sift their regional applications and focus on putting together a great line up within the Safari.

 

Bilateral challenges

Many of our members run challenge-based programmes. The natural evolution of the challenge process is to broaden the challenge across borders. The complex societal and environmental issues that we all face require a global response. A bilateral challenge involves two counterpart agencies (e.g. two Environment Agencies) to work together on a shared challenge area that meets shared policy priorities and supports economic development through harnessing the innovative solutions of regional companies.

This approach enables governments to open up to innovation networks they wouldn’t otherwise have access to, and work together far more closely than they have been able to previously, because of the in-house Innovation Teams. Arguably, one of the best ways of improving domestic policy outcomes is to understand how other governments have achieved theirs. It enables closer collaboration at central government, agency, business and community levels. And as such, is an enabler of innovation diplomacy.

This is at the thin end of the wedge - an in-depth engagement, running parallel challenge based procurements. We would expect the following outcomes from a bilateral challenge process:

To develop closer governmental relationships through:

  • collaboration on shared policy/service delivery challenges;

  • improved inter-agency collaboration;

  • commitment to a match-funded process;

  • transference of knowledge and expertise in innovation processes;

  • transference of knowledge and expertise in policy areas;

  • greater understanding of governmental innovation processes through exposure to each other’s markets, organisations, methodologies;

Innovation diffusion through increased access to innovation networks including innovation centres and investors.

Increased opportunity for economic growth through access to two country markets for the successful companies taken forward.

The magic of serendipitous outcomes that can’t be forecast in a paper at the start of a collaborative journey!