Client Success Story
Client context
THE PROBLEM: Shortening the time required for government to innovate with industry.
THE SOLUTION: A groundbreaking data and systems framework designed for collaborative problem-solving.
Australia’s total trade in exports and imports exceeds $1 trillion each year but there are many points of friction experienced by importers, exporters, and the software providers who develop and run systems that enable trade. Streamlining and integration has the potential to save hundreds if not millions of dollars for participants.
Regulations often burden industries with excessive bureaucracy. Overcoming this challenge and reshaping trade supply chain regulations for improved efficiency and protection is no easy feat. Despite governmental efforts to integrate digital and logistics advancements, manual paper-based processes still dominate the trade supply chain. This is exacerbated by the lack of seamless communication between businesses and government entities, causing confusion about compliance requirements.
Government-led initiatives to simplify trade procedures often fall short of exploiting the wealth of data, industry best practices, and automation tools available in the broader ecosystem. This inward-looking approach leads to fragmented solutions that disrupt the supply chain’s continuity. Consequently, industry players face frustration, cost inefficiencies, and limited benefits. This underwhelming response further complicates matters and erodes confidence in ongoing efforts to reform trade practices
Our approach
Introducing the Sandbox!
We have revolutionised how we validate value by informing business case parameters, risks, and costs through the development of a functional prototype.
Traditional methods for co-designing government-industry solutions often fall into two extremes: high-risk large-scale endeavors or limited impact small-scale attempts. Government often relies on outdated practices ill-suited for fostering innovation and collaboration. These include time-consuming paper-based consultations, generalised user research that excludes decision-makers, resource-intensive business case procedures, and ineffective proof-of-concept trials. These methods are not only slow and expensive, but they also add complexity rather than simplicity. Their focus on appeasing everyone undermines the creation of practical solutions that drive learning. Even setting up a testing environment within government processes can take an arduous 12 to 24 months.
Our approach completely reimagines this process by:
- Launching a Ready-Made Framework: We establish a pre-built system that mimics new data exchanges between government and industry.
- Swift Custom Environments: We rapidly deploy tailor-made environments to collaboratively design and evolve real-world solutions into functional products.
- Unlocking Data Value: We empower both government and industry to recognise the untapped potential of their data assets, enabling previously inaccessible insights and exchanges.
- Accelerated Solution Development: Our solution accelerator brings together subject matter experts, digital specialists, and product managers. They collaborate intensively in carefully orchestrated sprints spanning 12 weeks, all under the guidance of digital government domain experts.
- Surfacing Hidden Insights: We capture, experiment with, and visualise real-time data dispersed across the ecosystem. These insights were previously hidden from both government and industry stakeholders.
In essence, our innovative approach flips the script, expediting value discovery, amplifying collaboration, and revealing data-driven truths that were once elusive.
Extensive engagement with the industry ecosystem
• 20 of Australia’s largest importers
• 10 major logistics providers & specialist operators
• 10 trade industry software providers
• 6 international customs brokers
• 2 peak bodies – IFCBAA and AI Group
Our thinking
Reason helped the Department of Agriculture rapidly co-design policy with industry to innovate the exchange of trade data.
With the Trade Innovation Sandbox, we proved the hypothesis that it was not only technically possible but also feasible to exchange pre-arrival data to speed up our supply chains and clearance processes.
From the get-go, we were actively engaged with stakeholders, forging strong partnerships and fostering a collaborative environment. Our team worked closely with experts and key players to identify opportunities for improvement and develop cutting-edge ideas that would drive the project forward.
Collaborating closely, we refined a policy that not only reduces the department’s workload, but also enhances compliance, lowers risks, and ensures a more efficient supply chain operation.
The Trade Innovation Sandbox serves as a practical and secure platform for all government agencies seeking to collaborate with industry partners on trade data exchange and solution co-design.
The outcome
Reason delivered a smarter, safer and faster government co-design experience with industry.
What typically required a multi-year comeback and significant paperwork was done in a more practical and demonstrable way. The Trade Innovation Sandbox made a difference for STEPS as a driver for transformation in supply chains and whole-of-government simplified trade use cases. The outputs are helping enable world-leading digital trade standards and innovation, keeping Australia at the forefront of regional and international trade opportunities, transforming government regulation and broader digital adoption in the economy.
The Trade Innovation Sandbox delivered the following results for STEPS:
- Developed new co-designed solutions within 1 month, providing early visibility and opportunities for government and industry to refine estimates and assumptions
- Onboarded and integrated 3rd party software used by the participants within hours using APIs
- Empowered industry participants to exchange data in real time, simulating solutions in real world scenarios
- Proved solution feasibility and development path to make first and second pass business cases stronger
- Tested whole-of-government and cross agency solution concepts
- Delivered a template and exemplar for government-industry co-design
In 2022 our work on the Trade Innovation Sandbox was showcased at Parliament House as a digital transformation exemplar. Read about it here
“Industry wants documentation earlier. The POC proved that we can use digital solutions to get ahead of the growing volume curve and provide earlier access to information. Early information is a motivator for government and importers to be more organised.” – Industry Participant
Our featured experts
Aleks Vranesevic
Partner
Amanda Phillips
Principal