DTO building marketplace for start-ups

The federal government has started a project to build an online marketplace for smaller businesses seeking to tender for a share of the government’s $5 billion annual spend on ICT projects.

The Digital Marketplace will serve as an online catalogue of services, people and technology available to help government departments with service transformation projects.

It is being led by the Digital Transformation Office and forms part of the government’s $1.1 billion National Innovation and Science Agenda. A public beta of the panel is expected to commence by the end of the year.

Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science Christopher Pyne said the government wants to open the marketplace to smaller and newly established companies that have previously found it too difficult to prove their credentials to the government.

“There have been too many hoops to jump through, so they simply haven’t bothered to apply for government ICT work,” he said.

“That’s a lost opportunity, because we know lots of businesses are on the cutting edge of digital innovation and can provide exciting solutions for governments to deliver better services at a lower cost.”

While the Digital Marketplace is being built, the DTO is establishing a series of targeted panels for providers. It has already launched the first of these, a digital specialists’ panel.

Over the next few months, the DTO will explore the obstacles that block ICT suppliers from providing digital products and services to government customers.

Image courtesy Dungodung