By means of a pressure cooker approach (i.e. with steam and boiling water), the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport intended, via a market consultation, to arrive at the initial development of an app that could map the spread of COVID-19 and warn people if they were near an infected person. The ambitious goal was to have the app working by 28 April 2020.

By selecting the candidates quickly, the aim was to work with a limited number of parties (7) to make a further developmental step and then choose the most promising. The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport communicated openly with the public about the development process.

None of the apps ultimately proved suitable. On the one hand, because the apps themselves showed shortcomings, particularly in the area of privacy, and on the other because it was not clear what the success criteria were. What should the app actually do and not do? And what requirements had to be met in terms of security and privacy? Then came the expected criticism: how was the selection of candidates made? Why not take a look abroad (where even in Singapore, the use is limited)? How could an important issue like privacy be so undervalued? There was definitely something valuable planned with the appathon: An app to help fight COVID-19 and a new approach based on crowd-sourcing. In addition, many people worked very hard to achieve the best possible result. We can only be full of praise for this. The (downside) risk was high, but it was certainly in proportion to the goal we were trying to achieve. Only the communicated deadline (28 April) was perhaps too optimistic. Partly due to this time pressure and limited preparation, this truly innovative approach failed. However, we can certainly speak of a Brilliant Failure, as there are valuable learning benefits.