Digitalization is spreading across all sectors and activities, from shopping to bank transfers and medical appointments, and even teleworking. However, there are still misgivings when it comes to voting, despite tools like blockchain technology allowing its security to be certified. In this context, the Barcelona-based startup Ekratos, specialized in organizing consultations with electronic voting, has gone a step further and will launch in September a digital tool that will allow direct contracting of its platform to organize consultations and votes.
Thus, with the software it has developed, any institution or entity that needs to conduct a certified vote will be able to contract it directly through the platform without needing to manage it with the company, and with the possibility of customizing it according to their needs. "Maximizing process automation, clients will be able to schedule their own vote without needing to contact us," explains Ekratos CEO, Ramón Pons.
Despite the incorporation of this model as a novelty, Ekratos will maintain its current line of offering electronic voting to institutions and entities through a direct communication process with the startup: "Some clients require personalized attention, and some even ask for technical assistance during the vote," Pons details. According to him, the possibility of directly contracting a personalized vote through the platform without needing to contact the company represents "something very novel that we have not seen in any competitor." "With this system, a vote can be designed and programmed in five minutes," assures Pons, who states that today there are no other platforms that allow programming electronic voting consultations with proprietary blockchain technology through this system.
The Ekratos project began in 2015 to provide service to city councils that wanted to consult their citizens, and each case was studied to design the votes. This initial model stemmed from the initiative of two partners linked to politics, who sought to innovate in voting methods beyond the ballot. With a third partner, they promoted the startup, which currently has five employees.
It was in 2019 when Ekratos developed a new platform, after verifying the security and traceability provided by blockchain technology in the buying and selling of cryptocurrencies. "We thought it would be totally applicable in the field of voting, and we developed our own blockchain with the Universitat de Girona." The result was a "totally versatile and adaptable platform" to the needs of clients, according to Pons. To use it, clients can choose to contract a one-time consultation or an annual subscription with which they can carry out more votes at a reduced price, which is around one euro per person on the census to be consulted.
Since its launch, Ekratos has carried out consultations and electoral processes in Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, and Andorra, including entities and institutions such as city councils, the Port of Barcelona, Comisiones Obreras (CC.OO.), the Consell Escolar de Catalunya, and professional associations. "There are countless cases and options for carrying out consultations, whether larger or smaller. Any union election, choosing the board of directors, voting on participatory budgets, and even a vote in a neighborhood community; the trend is to increasingly democratize bodies and processes," Pons defends.
Given these possibilities of electronic voting, Pons is confident that it will become established in electoral processesAnd electronic voting allows for greater participation in these processes: "From having to travel and queue, you go to being able to vote in 40 seconds with a device," highlights the CEO. So much so that the consultations carried out with the electronic voting of the Ekratos platform "have come to triple participation"regarding processes of the same entity through in-person voting. Additionally, through technologyblockchain, Ekratos has incorporated vote traceability, and any participant can self-certify that their vote has been correctly counted in the electronic ballot box.
"Blockchain is the most advanced and secure technology that exists today," also in terms of guaranteeing the secret ballot: "Not even we can know who votes or how they vote; we can only create and destroy the voting process". Given these possibilities of electronic voting, Pons trusts that it will become established in electoral processes: "We make all kinds of purchases and online inquiries, and what is strange is that electronic voting is not established at a national level." Countries like Estonia and Brazil and certain territories in Switzerland and the United States already apply it. "I hope we don't take long in Spain," Pons maintains, because "the digital era advances day by day, and we cannot continue using systems that do not fit with the 21st century."
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