The WSP.NRW as a central digital gateway for the economy

An important building block for the digitization of public administration in North Rhine-Westphalia was the Gewerbe-Service-Portal.NRW (GSP.NRW). It was introduced in July 2018. The media-free processing of the processes depicted on it was part of the scope of services of GSP.NRW from the outset.

With the Economic Portal Act (WiPG NRW), which entered into force on 1 July 2020, the GSP.NRW became the Economic Service Portal.NRW (WSP.NRW). With the law, the WSP.NRW became the central digital gateway for the economy in North Rhine-Westphalia.

In the following overview you will find more information about technical content, the IT architecture of online services and the legal basis.

Introduction

In July 2018, the Gewerbe-Service-Portal.NRW (GSP.NRW) was created as an important building block for the digitization of public administration in NRW. One focus of this portal was the media-break-free processing of the processes depicted on it.

With the Economic Portal Act (WiPG NRW), which entered into force on 1 July 2020, the GSP.NRW became the Economic Service Portal.NRW (WSP.NRW). As a result, various requirements were met: the EU Single Digital Gateway Regulation (SDG), the European Services and Professional Recognition Directive (Service of the Single Point of Contact) and Sections 71 et seq. of the Administrative Procedure Act (VwVfG); management of administrative procedures through a single entity).

Through the WSP.NRW, administrative services are provided both in the front-end and via standardized interfaces in a media-break-free return channel (online access law maturity level 3) for enforcement, for companies and for traders.

The implementation of the WSP.NRW is particularly embedded in the topic of corporate management and development (UFE) of the Online Access Act (OZG). The subject area includes around eight life situations or corporate situations, which can be integrated into the WSP.NRW with implementation projects.

Administrative services for the economy can also be found in other areas such as the environment, taxation and customs, as well as mobility and work. In this way, the WSP.NRW also enables specialist procedures to be connected – in accordance with the requirements of the Wirtschafts-Portal-Gesetz NRW.

Current objectives of the WSP.NRW are:

• digital, media-free mapping of business-related CSO services
• Creation of a one-stop shop for digital services of the economy
• the acceleration of CSO implementation by means of scalable digitization roads
• the acceleration and practicable design of standardization with the core data and legal form model XCompany (technology-neutral format standardization)
• the achievement of the co- and reusability of the software solutions created by using open source technologies and their scalable deployment in public administration data centers (Software as a Service: SaaS).

At the 2021 eGovernment Competition under the auspices of the Federal Chancellery, the WSP.NRW was twice as enthusiastic about its innovative approach: It was awarded first place in the categories ‘Best CSO or Register Modernisation Project 2021’ and ‘Public Award 2021’.