Bürokratt will enable Estonia’s citizens to access all public services such as applying for family benefits, filing taxes, renewing a passport and in the future even applying for a bank loan without the need to remember. Bürokratt will remind citizens ahead of time when upcoming actions are required. Bürokratt services and information will be personalised based on the user’s data, not simply a repetition of public information based on user questions, as most virtual assistants currently operate.

Bürokratt has been designed to eradicate bureaucratic processes and make public services radically easier to use as well as more convenient and accessible. Citizens can authorise and consent to certain deeds and actions, such as the submission of applications, making of payments or contracts or change of data in registries through a voice-based interaction with an AI-based virtual assistant on any common device, such as a mobile phone. 

In the very near future, the service will give citizens the opportunity to share data on the basis of consent for the development and provision of services outside the country. By giving consent, data can be shared more easily, thus enabling companies to implement new services as well as improve existing ones. For example, it would be easier to apply for a loan from a bank, as a person does not have to enter the data in the form himself, but everything is required from the state registers. This will help private and public services to be inoperable providing the most seamless user experience for Estonia’s citizens. 

“Under Bürokratt, citizens won’t have to know or spend time searching for information on separate government websites to find a particular service. Rather, people will have services offered to them and delivered in an integrated manner, around their needs. In the same way, Alexa plays you a song and Siri assists you with your phone calls, Bürokratt will enable citizens to access their own personal data and get support with government services. Both the launch and implementation of Bürokratt will be a testament to Estonian technology and will certainly inspire more governments to transform the citizen user experience. AI-based voice-interactive virtual assistants will be the future for other governments around the world, but now they’re a reality for the Estonian people.” said Ott Velsberg, Chief Data Officer of Estonia.

Siim Sikkut, the CIO of the Estonian Government, said: “As the number one digital society in the world, the Estonian government recognises the power and need for digitalisation, particularly with respect to how public services operate from the user perspective. AI-based tools like Bürokratt provide citizens with seamless and integrated services that are rightfully tailored to the individual and their life events. The user experience will not rely on citizens having the appropriate digital skills to be able to operate interfaces such as apps or websites but will operate through the most intuitive communication mode, that is – voice.” 

Interview Siim Sikkut, Government CIO Estonia – Digital Testbed Framework, Digital Government Innovation Model:

Please find more information about the new Bürokratt digital public service interface:

https://en.kratid.ee/buerokratt-v2 

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post The World’s First Public Service AI-based Virtual Assistant Launched By The Estonian Government appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Being selected amongst the world’s TOP20 most influential people in digital government in 2018 and 2019 by Apolitical, Siim Sikkut, Deputy Secretary-General for IT and Telecom and Government CIO of Estonia, has been involved in many of Estonia’s digital solutions: from the e-residency program to the recently launched Digital Testbed Framework to help businesses thrive.

In fact, and as it can be seen in the interview carried out by citiesabc and openbusinesscouncil founder Dinis Guarda, Mr Sikkut is especially proud of the work his office has done to get Digital Testbed Framework off the ground, describing it as “a new and innovative collaboration model looking to attract partners globally.” The framework gives access to start-ups, scale-ups and all government technology innovators to the technologies and experience of the world-leading digital government of Estonia. They only ask for the free use of the resulting novel solution in return. A small price to pay for such an opportunity.

Key Facts

• Siim Sikkut is the Deputy Secretary-General for IT and Telecom, and Government CIO of Estonia in office since 2017. Mr. Sikkut is responsible for strategizing the launch of development initiatives and regulation. He also represents the government in the EU and other international organisations, promoting and collaborating on policies concerning technology and digital adoption.

• The Estonian government has launched some remarkably unique initiatives under his leadership like e-Residency and more recently, the Digital Testbed Network.

• The interview is part of the citiesabc openbusinesscouncil Youtube Podcast series, where leaders and influencing personalities across various cities share and present their insights, potentially making global impacts.

Having launched some ground-breaking initiatives for digitization of the Estonian economy under his leadership, Siim talks about his trajectory of work and his journey experiences. Siim pointedly states that his appetite for technology, since childhood, was due to the Estonian government’s initial efforts of digitization.

“We’ve had motivation and drive. Making our government digital has not been a cool project for us. It’s been a necessity. Given as small as we are, 1.3 million people, even less than 2, we have to be very efficient and effective with the limited resources we have if we wanted to be anything in the world,” recounts Siim as the driving motive behind the fast-paced digitization of the Estonian economy.

Taking help from a series of phenomenal dynamics, Estonia is now one of the most advanced digital societies.  Dinis asks Siim to highlight the success and scope of eResidency, a programme launched by Estonia in 2014.

He modestly explains, “It is a realization that a digital identity or an e-resident from any part of the world can get access to Estonian government services.” Under this revolutionary program, e-residents get a smart card that can be used to sign documents digitally. The program is aimed towards location-independent entrepreneurs such as software developers, writers, innovators and more. Their financial footprint is monitored digitally, in a manner stated to be transparent.

More Interviews

From The Oscars to Bollywood: Dinis Guarda Interviews The Multitalented Amrita Sen On Her Career In Music, Film And Design

Interview with Nick Jonsson – Co-founder & MD at EGN Singapore – Asia’s largest Confidential Peer Network for the C-Suite, International Best Selling Author

Interview with Rishi Kapoor, Founder & CEO of paus.tv – The Revolutionary Streaming Platform For Independent Creators

Interview with Daniel Liu – Co-Founder of NFT Creative Studio INFLUXO – Creating The Ronaldinho NFT Collection

Interview with Alvin Foo – Co-Founder at DAOventures, Emerging Tech & Marketing Evangelist, AI, Blockchain, DeFi

Dinis Guarda Interviews Liti Capital’s David Kay On Litigation Finance: “We Are Going To Be There To Help People That Are Getting Scammed, Defrauded In The Crypto Space”

The Digital Testbed Framework Initiative

When Dinis brought their recent initiative Digital Testbed Framework & Digital Government Innovation model to the conversation, Siim stated that the Digital Testbed Framework is a new and innovative collaboration model looking to attract partners globally. It gives start-ups, scale-ups and all government technology innovators, access to the technologies and experience of the world-leading digital government of Estonia – in return for the free use of the resulting novel solution.

The initiative was designed with simplicity and efficiency in mind. Users can produce government-level IT solutions safely and quickly, via live-market testing and approval in a nationwide digital government testbed, without having to navigate any red tape or lengthy sales or approval processes.

Through this cooperation model, users will have access to the government tech stack, know-how (and in some cases data) to help develop their own emerging commercial solutions. It also allows them to partner with one of the most digitally developed countries in the world to “rubber stamp” their ideas and obtains proof of concept.

The Digital Testbed Framework has been used by the Estonian parliament and the Ministry of Education and Research to collaborate on reusable AI components, and the Estonian Health Board to create HOIA – the official COVID-19 exposure notification app for Estonia.

It’s also been deployed across applications such as the TEXTA Toolkit (which uses AI functionality to predict whether comments should or shouldn’t be published in public forums) as well as being hugely successful in helping the Police and Border Guard Board detect domestic violence cases.

Recently the Estonian government has launched its digital testbed framework. Find out what the digital testbed framework is from the interview with Siim @sikkut, government CIO of Estonia.
Dinis Guarda citiesabc openbusinesscouncil Youtube Podcast series: https://t.co/8WIabHVcf0 pic.twitter.com/YwnTuhRgAp

— openbusinesscouncil (@openbusinesshq) October 11, 2021

“The problem many start-ups face today is that the environment for cooperation the public sector is built on is old, outdated and inflexible and this makes integration and collaboration difficult. As the saying goes, ‘there’s no need to reinvent the wheel,’ and that’s why we’re inviting anyone and everyone to use the same tech stack we use to run and build our own digital government, for free.”

Culminating the interview, Siim takes the citiesabc openbusinesscouncil platform to warmly invite active global participation in Estonia’s digital testbed framework to analyze its vastness and versatility.

“We want to partner with innovative people from all over the world and in a variety of sectors. Whether you’re a coder wanting help improve the digital services of Estonia, or an entrepreneur looking to test your solution with one of the most digitally advanced nations in the world – we’d love to connect with you.”  

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Unveiling Estonia’s Digital Government Innovation Model: Dinis Guarda Interviews Siim Sikkut, Government CIO of Estonia appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Mr. Sikkut is responsible for setting the strategy and policies to launch and steer strategic development initiatives and regulation. He also represents the government in the EU and other international organisations, commenting and collaborating on policies concerning technology and digital adoption.

Siim Sikkut was selected to the world’s TOP20 most influential people in digital government in 2018 and 2019 by Apolitical.

Siim is frequently interviewed by top tier publications in the US, for example in the Wall Street Journal where he discussed Estonia’s plan for AI strategy.

Under Siim’s leadership, the Estonian government has launched different initiatives. He is one of the founders of Estonia’s groundbreaking e-Residency programme, which allows non-Estonians access to Estonian services such as company formation, banking, payment processing, and taxation. The program gives the e-resident a smart card which they can use to sign documents.

More recently, Siim was also behind the Digital Testbed Framework, a new and innovative collaboration model looking to attract partners globally. It gives start-ups, scale-ups and all govtech innovators, access to the technologies and experience of the world-leading digital government of Estonia – in return for free use of the resulting novel solution.

Siim Sikkut Interview Focus

1. An introduction from you – background, overview, education…

2. Career highlights – education

3. Can you tell us some of the major improvements and solutions / benchmarks that made Estonia a success?

4. What is the Estonian Government’s take on:

a. E-residency

b. Digital government and society as well as telecommunications and post areas?

5. The data for e-Estonia is not stored centrally but instead uses a data platform run by the government called X-Road to link information from local hosts. What can you tell us about it?

6. Estonia has one of the highest number of startups per capita in the world, and one reason is the ease of establishing a business. Since 2011, a new company can be registered online in less than 20 minutes and 98% of new companies are entered in the e-Business Register digitally. That initiative has made possible an impressive number of unicorns in Estonia: Skype, Wise, Skype, Ktech, Zego, ID.me. How can you weigh on this success?

7. Can you talk about the Digital Testbed Framework And Digital Government Innovation Model?

8. How do you cope with the challenges of digital disruption and fragmentation in tech and geopolitics?

9. You were responsible for Estonia’s plan for AI strategy. Can you tell us about that?

10. You are the Chairman of the OECD Senior Digital Government Officials Working Party (E-leaders). Can you share how it works and the vision?

11. Estonia was the first Nation-State in the world to deploy blockchain technology in production systems – in 2012 with the Succession Registry kept by the Ministry of Justice. Also using blockchain for elections, health records.  Can you tell us about it, some case studies?

12. You are also part of the Nordic Institute for Interoperability Solutions (NIIS), a non-profit association with a mission to ensure the development and strategic management of X-Road. Can you tell us about it?

13. What websites and places can you come to know more about Estonia’s digital initiatives?

More Interviews

From The Oscars to Bollywood: Dinis Guarda Interviews The Multitalented Amrita Sen On Her Career In Music, Film And Design

Interview with Nick Jonsson – Co-founder & MD at EGN Singapore – Asia’s largest Confidential Peer Network for the C-Suite, International Best Selling Author

Interview with Rishi Kapoor, Founder & CEO of paus.tv – The Revolutionary Streaming Platform For Independent Creators

Interview with Daniel Liu – Co-Founder of NFT Creative Studio INFLUXO – Creating The Ronaldinho NFT Collection

Interview with Alvin Foo – Co-Founder at DAOventures, Emerging Tech & Marketing Evangelist, AI, Blockchain, DeFi

Dinis Guarda Interviews Liti Capital’s David Kay On Litigation Finance: “We Are Going To Be There To Help People That Are Getting Scammed, Defrauded In The Crypto Space”

The Digital Testbed Framework

The Digital Testbed Framework is a new and innovative collaboration model looking to attract partners globally. It gives start-ups, scale-ups and all govtech innovators, access to the technologies and experience of the world-leading digital government of Estonia – in return for free use of the resulting novel solution.

The initiative has been designed with simplicity and efficiency in mind. Users can produce government-level IT solutions safely and quickly, via live-market testing and approval in a nation-wide digital government testbed, without having to navigate any red tape or lengthy sales or approval processes.

Through this cooperation model, users will have access to the government tech stack, know-how (and in some cases data) to help develop their own emerging commercial solutions. It also allows them to partner with one of the most digitally developed countries in the world to “rubber stamp” their ideas and obtain proof of concept.

The Digital Testbed Framework has been used by the Estonian parliament and the Ministry of Education and Research to collaborate on reusable AI components, and the Estonian Health Board to create HOIA – the official COVID-19 exposure notification app for Estonia.

It’s also been deployed across applications such as the TEXTA Toolkit (which uses AI functionality to predict whether comments should or shouldn’t be published in public forums) as well as being hugely successful in helping the Police and Border Guard Board detect domestic violence cases.

Siim Sikkut said about the programme:

“The problem many start-ups face today is that the environment for cooperation the public sector is built on is old, outdated and inflexible and this makes integration and collaboration difficult. As the saying goes, ‘there’s no need to reinvent the wheel,’ and that’s why we’re inviting anyone and everyone to use the same tech stack we use to run and build our own digital government, for free.

We want to partner with innovative people from all over the world and in a variety of sectors. Whether you’re a coder wanting help improve the digital services of Estonia, or an entrepreneur looking to test your solution with one of the most digitally advanced nations in the world – we’d love to connect with you.”  

The e-residency program

The e-residency is a program launched by Estonia on 1 December 2014. The program allows non-Estonians access to Estonian services such as company formation, banking, payment processing, and taxation. The program gives the e-resident a smart card which they can use to sign documents. The program is aimed towards location-independent entrepreneurs such as software developers and writers.

E-residents will have their financial footprint monitored digitally, in a manner stated to be transparent; the reaction to the widespread financial misbehaviour at high level revealed by the Panama Papers leak was suggested to be a factor helping the more transparent Estonian initiative according to Korjus. E-residency itself does not have an effect on income taxation — neither does it establish an income tax liability in Estonia nor does it relieve income taxation in the resident’s home country.

E-residency allows company registration, document signing, encrypted-document exchange, online banking, tax declaration, and fulfilment of medical prescriptions. Other services become available as the scheme is expanded. A digital ID smart card issued by the Estonian Police and Border Guard Board in Estonia or at an embassy is used for access to services.

Korjus said that registering an Estonian business was “useful for internet entrepreneurs in emerging markets who don’t have access to an online payment provider”, and for startups from countries such as Ukraine or Belarus which suffer financial limitations from their governments.

E-residency is not related to citizenship and does not give the right to physically enter or reside in Estonia

Siim Sikkut Links And Sources

https://e-estonia.com/testbed/

https://live.worldbank.org/experts/siim-sikkut

https://ee.linkedin.com/in/siimsikkut

https://www.visitestonia.com/en/why-estonia/12-digital-services-in-e-estonia

https://e-estonia.com/cio-of-estonia-siim-sikkut-opens-the-countrys-tech-stack-to-the-world/

https://twitter.com/sikkut?lang=en

https://www.mkm.ee/en/ministry-contact/management

https://e-resident.gov.ee/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Estonia

About citiesabc.com
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About openbusinesscouncil.org
https://www.openbusinesscouncil.org/

4IR: AI Blockchain Fintech IoT Reinventing a Nation by Dinis Guarda and Rais Hussin (4irbook.com)

Dinis Guarda citiesabc openbusinesscouncil Series is also available as podcast on

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dinis-guarda-citiesabc-openbusinesscouncil-series/id1510330391

On Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1vA8KaDaRpJ0mAfpNbfTSF?si=H_WngL4RSOyu1W7VAmM41w&dl_branch=1

Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5idXp6c3Byb3V0LmNvbS8xMDMyMzg4LnJzcw==

Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/953a5156-823c-4e86-baeb-4fda1128e44c/DINIS-GUARDA-CITIESABC-OPENBUSINESSCOUNCIL-SERIES

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Interview with Siim Sikkut, Government CIO of Estonia – Digital Testbed Framework And Digital Government Innovation Model appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

E-Residents of Estonia have established 13,000 Estonian companies worldwide since the launch of the e-Residency programme in December 2014 and have now accumulated a total turnover exceeding £1.5 billion.

The growth has been fuelled by a recent substantial increase in Estonian companies established by e-Residents to gain access to the EU market. e-Residency has also reported a significant increase of new e-residents since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak.

According to Ott Vatter, Managing Director of e-Residency, turnover of e-Residents’ companies is increasing rapidly. He said: “In 2016, the total turnover of e-Residents’ companies based in Estonia totalled £65 million. Last year, it increased more than sevenfold, totalling £480 million.” Rapid growth, he says, is based on the recent increase in Estonian companies established by e-Residents. E-Residents have launched 8,300 new businesses in Estonia over the last two years, compared to a total Estonian population of 1.3 million.

“In 2019, e-Residents established a sixth of all new companies created in Estonia. This means that on average, e-residents created 11 companies every day between 2018 and 2019. However, over the first quarter of 2020 that involved COVID-19 outbreak in European Union countries, including Estonia, e-residents created nearly 50% more companies than during the same period in 2019. This demonstrates that location independent company administration is even more relevant in a global crisis situation,” says Vatter.

Total turnover growth of e-Residents’ Estonian companies has also driven the growth of the same businesses’ average tax revenue. In 2019, the cumulative average tax revenue created by e-Residents’ Estonian companies increased by 32%. “A large number of e-Resident companies have taken their products and services to the global market, many of which have benefitted from becoming EU companies thanks to e-Residency, having also generated customer demand on a global level. Also, most businesses launched by e-Residents play an active part in building a knowledge-based society, and are active in fields that create remarkable added additional value to the economy,” explained Vatter.

Many e-Residents who have established companies in Estonia within the last six months are still working hard on product and service development. “Entrepreneurs all around the world see the added value that e-Residency brings, as we’re providing them with the opportunity to use Estonian digital e-services and run their company remotely. With the COVID-19 pandemic still ongoing, many countries around the world are still fully or partly in lockdown, which means entrepreneurs and SMEs are desperately looking for alternative ways to keep their companies running. E-Residency will always be there to support those companies who are anxious about the future.”

The E-Residency programme was launched by Estonian Government in 2014 with the aim to offer non-residents across the world secure and transparent access to Estonian pioneering digital services. Owners of e-Resident digital ID-cards can digitally sign documents, and access portals and information systems that accept Estonian ID-cards that are eIDAS compliant. E-Residency itself does not give Estonian citizenship, tax-residency, residency or right to enter Estonia or the European Union.

About e-Residency

The e-Residency programme was founded in 2014 and has, since then, reached over 70,000 digital entrepreneurs. The programme is built on Estonia’s 20+ years’ of experience to provide digital public services for Estonian citizens.

Everyone can apply for this transnational government-issued digital identity and benefit from the e-Residency platform, which is built on inclusion, legitimacy and transparency.  E-Residency allows access to Estonia’s public e-services and a variety of e-services provided by international service providers, all part of Estonia’s X-Road, which links all public services together and enables each service to work in harmony. All outgoing data is digitally signed and encrypted, and all incoming data is authenticated and logged, meaning that e-Residents’ and other users of the X-Road’s data is completely secure.This provides the freedom to easily start and run a global EU company fully online from anywhere in the world.

E-residents can: open a company within a day and run the company remotely, apply for a business banking account and credit card, conduct e-banking, use international payment service providers, declare taxes, and sign documents digitally. E-Residency does not provide citizenship, tax residency, physical residency or the right to travel to Estonia or EU.

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post e-Residency: Estonian e-Residents Create 13k Companies With A Turnover of £1.5 Billion Since Launch appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.