Georgia’s innovation lab is like ‘reverse Shark Tank’

Since Georgia officials announced the state’s “innovation lab” last May, progress has been “marching along really well,” Nikhil Deshpande, the state’s chief digital and artificial intelligence officer, told StateScoop. The lab, which he said will have a physical space and an online component, will allow state agencies to visit when they have a problem they want to solve, but aren’t sure which technologies they should use. Deshpande said the state is pre-qualifying vendors with the aim of creating a “reverse Shark Tank” set-up in which agencies can select their preferred solutions. “The idea is to have agencies show up with their business problems or their use cases and then [the Georgia Technology Authority] plays the role of vetting those and making sure we can apply that towards an emerging technology solution,” he said.

This video was recorded on Oct. 1, 2024, at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers annual conference in New Orleans.