GRAND FORKS — Two new state digital tools designed to meet the needs of businesses were unveiled during the 2025 Greater North Dakota Chamber’s North Dakota Future Forum, held Wednesday at Minnkota Power Cooperative in Grand Forks.
The tools, each targeted to gather information and resources in specific spots for doing business in North Dakota, already have been soft launched, said Corey Mock, CIO of North Dakota Information Technology. They will continue to be updated and expanded.
“This is a first draft, and this will change,” he said. “But we got started, and now we’re excited because we’re proving the concept.”
Mock unveiled the tools at the end of the forum and following the final session, which discussed technology innovation and how it will advance communities. The talk touched on things like artificial intelligence, keeping people in the state, companies partnering with communities and other items, finished by Mock’s explanation of the state’s two new tools: the ND Gateway and State Data Hub.
The ND Gateway has been part of an ongoing initiative to simplify how taxpayers, residents and businesses interact and do business within the state, Mock said, with some of the initial discussions dating back to 2023. The gateway works in conjunction with state agencies, such as the North Dakota Secretary of State’s Office, North Dakota Job Service and North Dakota Workforce Safety and Insurance, to create a clearinghouse for all the information needed for someone seeking to do business in North Dakota.
Mock compared the gateway to the entrance of a shopping mall, where all the options or stores still exist with their own access points, but the gateway is the overlay that connects everything. People doing business in North Dakota can go to the gateway as a singular place to ask questions or start the process of beginning a business without having to go to multiple agencies to figure out what needs to be done.
“If you go to any state IT department, any technology CIO national conference, one of the leading topics you’re going to hear at every one of them is having some sort of a gateway, a portal, something (where) citizens and businesses can access government services,” Mock said.
The State Data Hub also focuses on putting information in one accessible place. The state collects a multitude of data, Mock said, but it doesn’t know how much it has. NDIT has been working on inventorying the data, as well as how to standardize the data fields. The hub is intended to be a collection link. Agencies will be able to share data with the hub, people will be able to access the data and businesses will be able to make long-term strategic decisions after looking at the data, Mock said.
“The data hub is probably the unspoken hero of what our businesses and communities need to really hit that next level,” Mock said. “North Dakota, being a business-friendly state, it’s not just in the regulations and the policies and that level of access. It’s providing something that is so underappreciated, and that’s good information — good, reliable information that can help businesses make those decisions, (to) help them succeed.”
The tools are available at
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Otto is the region reporter for the Grand Forks Herald.
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