The Sri Lankan Cabinet has approved a proposal to build a centralised “GovTech App/Service Marketplace” in three phases over 2026 and 2027 at an estimated cost of Rs. 563 million, Cabinet Spokesman Vijitha Herath announced on Wednesday.
The platform is designed to replace fragmented ICT procurement across state institutions with a single “one-stop-shop” where government bodies can select digital products and services from a unified catalogue. Each agency currently procures technology solutions independently, a pattern Herath said has produced transparency problems and inefficient spending across the public sector.
“It is expected to introduce a merit-based system for selecting digital products and services,” the cabinet paper noted, according to EconomyNext. The platform will also open state contracts to a wider pool of suppliers, including Small and Medium Enterprises — a segment often shut out of direct dealings with individual ministries.
Herath, who holds the Foreign Affairs, Foreign Employment and Tourism portfolios alongside his role as Cabinet Spokesman, said the marketplace would be rolled out in phases and is intended to cut duplicated spending across agencies. Specific phase-by-phase timelines were not disclosed at the briefing.
The move sits within a broader push to formalise government digital infrastructure. Parliament is already considering a Digital Governance Bill, and the cabinet has previously approved work on a biometric-based national digital identity system to anchor citizen-facing services. The GovTech marketplace covers the supply-side plumbing — how the state buys the software and services those initiatives depend on.
