Municipalities, flip the tender on its head 

There are 342 municipalities in The Netherlands, all carrying out comparable tasks. Yet, they often pay separately for software, integrations and extensions that are barely any different from those of other municipalities. Public money disappears into solutions that other municipalities cannot or may not reuse.

Of course, no two municipalities are the same. A large city grapples with different issues than a rural municipality, and local political choices always shape processes slightly differently.

Yet municipalities still buy software remarkably often as if every organisation were a completely unique case. As a result, municipality A builds an integration with the Environment and Planning Portal (Omgevingsloket), while municipality B has almost the same thing developed a few months later. And each time, budget, time and capacity are poured into it all over again.

The 'Open unless' policy (Open, tenzij) tries to change exactly that. The starting point is slowly shifting: software developed with public money should also be usable by other government bodies. Sounds logical. Except for in practice, it often works out the other way round.

The strange logic of tenders

At their core, tenders still revolve around the same checklists. Functionality, timeline, price, implementation capacity. All important elements, but the comparison misses something essential: what happens after implementation?

Can other municipalities piggyback on the same investment? Does the data remain easily accessible? Can you switch suppliers later without enormous migration costs? Can another party take over management or further development? These are the kinds of questions that turn the whole discussion upside down.

Because currently the order is reversed. A tender usually starts with the supplier. Only afterwards does it become clear which product, platform or ecosystem lies behind it.

Why not first determine which (open) solution or architecture best fits the problem you want to solve? You can still put it out to tender afterwards. Except then suppliers compete on service, implementation and expertise, rather than on licenses and dependency. That's a completely different market dynamic.       

The tender determines more than you think

The choice of software is about far more than functionality. You are also choosing:

• how much freedom you'll have later
• who decides what gets developed further
• how easily systems work together
• whether you become dependent on a single supplier
• how much other municipalities can reuse
• how expensive switching becomes

Software is still too often purchased as if it were a standalone project. Yet that choice affects extensions, integrations, costs and flexibility for years to come.

You usually only notice this later. For example, when a municipality wants to give residents real-time insight into the status of permit applications. Or the moment data from the case management system (zaaksysteem) needs to be combined with information from other applications. Suddenly it turns out that data is only pleasant to use within its own system, integrations break with every change, and a relatively small extension turns into a project lasting months.

Public money deserves better returns

We believe the discussion about open source is still too often seen as a technical matter for architects and IT departments. Say Groningen invests in better security for resident portals — shouldn't Breda benefit from that too? If Eindhoven develops an integration between the case management system and a national facility, why should Zwolle have to pay for it all over again? That's how public money disappears into software that other municipalities can't reuse.

Collaboration doesn't have to be complicated

If municipalities want to reuse more, that automatically means collaborating more too. And no, that doesn't require setting up large programmes and steering committees. Sometimes collaboration simply starts small. An open component for public space reports. A reusable API. A smart integration with MijnOverheid (the Dutch citizen portal). One municipality takes the initiative, others join in, and suppliers provide support or extensions.

In the open-source world, this model has worked successfully for years. There, suppliers compete by offering better service. That's much healthier than locking customers into your own system. 

Support also works differently than many people think. Municipalities aren't tied to a single supplier that is the only one allowed to provide support. That creates more freedom of choice.

How to flip your next tender on its head

No one expects municipalities to replace their entire IT landscape tomorrow. Nor does that need to happen. The most interesting shift isn't in one enormous migration, but in new choices. Tenders in which reuse genuinely counts. Projects in which open standards become more important than closed ecosystems.

Municipalities differ in size, ambitions and local choices. But that doesn't mean every municipality has to reinvent the wheel.

You can already procure more intelligently tomorrow:

• Explicitly include reuse in your assessment criteria
• Ask about open standards and data portability
• Value collaboration between municipalities
• Ask how code and knowledge remain transferable
• Assess not just the purchase cost, but also the collective value
• Start with a single process or component

Then software shifts from being a closed product to something municipalities collectively stay in control of.

The real question

We've come to accept it as normal that public investments end up in closed systems. That municipalities pay again for comparable solutions. That switching becomes complicated and expensive once a supplier is deeply embedded in the organisation. That assumption needs to be scrapped.

WeAreFrank! helps municipalities and other government bodies gain more control over their IT landscape. By connecting systems intelligently, making data more accessible and making collaboration easier to organise, more room emerges for reuse and freedom of choice.

Book a call and discover how much money, time and frustration municipalities can save once software becomes something you're in control of again.