What ETHELO DECISIONS does

Ethelo Decisions (legal entity: Ethelo Democracy Society) is a Vancouver-based software company that builds a proprietary group decision-making platform used by governments, non-profits, Indigenous organizations, healthcare providers, political parties, and Web3/DAOs to run participatory decision processes at scale. The core technology combines a decision algorithm with a social-media-style interface that enables distributed groups to explore trade-offs, deliberate in real time, and converge on options with broad support across devices and languages.

The product set centers on the Ethelo Decision Technology engine, augmented by specialized modules including Citizen Budget (acquired in 2019) for public-sector budget prioritization, Community Pulsecheck and Employee Pulsecheck for ongoing stakeholder and staff feedback, and an eDemocracy Platform for transparent policy and bylaw development. Documented deployments include municipal budget processes (Whitby reported a 7,750% participation increase; Stratford engaged 10% of residents), federal evaluations (Infrastructure Canada's Smart Cities Challenge across 130 proposals with 17 criteria), the Government of Canada's Climate Targets 2035 engagement with 11,000 participants, and DAO governance (Arbitrum, Big Green DAO distributing $1.8M across 75+ organizations).

Ethelo monetizes through quote-based annual subscriptions and professional services, selling primarily via a direct, consultation-led motion. The company is privately held, has 11-50 employees, and has not disclosed external funding rounds, operating as a "Democracy Society" rather than a conventional venture-backed entity.

Name

ETHELO DECISIONS

Legal name

Ethelo Democracy Society

Website

https://ethelodecisions.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2010

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Ethelo Decisions is a Vancouver-based SaaS company whose proprietary decision-making platform helps governments, non-profits, healthcare organizations, and DAOs run large-scale participatory processes that identify broadly supported outcomes. It sells annual subscriptions and professional services primarily through a direct, consultation-led sales motion.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Group Decision-Making Software

NAICS

Marketing Research and Public Opinion Polling (541910)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. (7370), Services-Management Services (8741)

akta.pro primary industry

Real-Time Decisioning & Next-Best-Action Engines (HDAAAHAK)

akta.pro secondary industry

Business Rules Management Systems (BRMS) & Decision Automation (HDAEAHAE)

Keywords

• Group decision software
• Digital democracy platform
• Participatory decision-making
• Consensus building software
• Citizen engagement platform

Headquarters

HQ city

Vancouver

HQ country

Canada

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Platform Licensing and Subscriptions: Ethelo provides its decision technology platform to government agencies, organizations, and communities on a subscription basis, enabling them to conduct participatory decision-making processes ranging from budget planning to policy development.
2. Professional Services: Implementation and consulting services for organizations deploying Ethelo's platform, including setup, training, and support for complex decision-making processes such as grant evaluation, strategic planning, and community engagement.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Ethelo Decisions provides a software platform for group decision-making that combines proprietary algorithms with a social-media-style interface to enable real-time deliberation, trade-off exploration, and consensus finding among large, distributed groups. The platform is licensed primarily to government agencies, non-profits, DAOs, and other organizations to facilitate participatory processes such as budget prioritization, policy development, grant allocation, and strategic planning, and is delivered alongside implementation and consulting services.

Product overview

Ethelo is a group solutions technology platform comprising its core Decision Technology engine along with specialized modules including Citizen Budget for public sector budget prioritization, Community Pulsecheck for stakeholder feedback collection, Employee Pulsecheck for internal organizational surveys, and an eDemocracy Platform for transparent participatory governance. The platform leverages multiple engagement channels including websites, surveys, ideation tools, and social media interfaces to help groups find fair solutions with broad support.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Ethelo Decision Technology Ethelo's core group decision-making platform that helps organizations find fair solutions with broad stakeholder support through collaborative engagement processes, using a proprietary algorithm and social-media-style interface.
• eDemocracy Platform A transparent and validated digital democracy platform for engaging residents and stakeholders in policy decisions, bylaw development, and strategic planning processes.
• Citizen Budget A specialized solution enabling government entities to engage citizens in budget prioritization decisions, allowing residents to explore trade-offs and allocate resources across competing priorities.

Quantifiable outcome

• 76%+ of participants support results of Ethelo processes (based on exit surveys of thousands of participants)
• +4 more outcomes

Named customers14 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature3 records

Scale indicators5 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Emerging players

• Pol.is: Pol.is is an open-source, real-time opinion-mapping platform that surfaces consensus and disagreement across large groups. It shares Ethelo's algorithmic consensus orientation and has been used in similar civic deliberation contexts (e.g., vTaiwan, Mozilla), but is a smaller, research-leaning player.

Direct peers

• ThoughtExchange: ThoughtExchange runs a large-scale stakeholder dialogue and prioritization platform used by school districts, governments, and enterprises. Its 'ranking and discussion' model overlaps Ethelo's prioritization and consensus-finding engine, particularly in employee and community engagement use cases.
• Delib: Delib provides citizen engagement and consultation software (Citizen Space) used by UK and international public-sector bodies for statutory consultations and deliberative exercises. It overlaps with Ethelo's eDemocracy platform for the public consultation workflow.
• Consul Democracy: Consul (originally from Madrid) is a widely deployed open-source e-democracy platform enabling citizen proposals, debates, and budget voting. It is functionally overlapping with Ethelo's deliberation and citizen engagement modules and is frequently evaluated as an alternative by municipal procurement teams.
• CitizenLab: CitizenLab is a SaaS civic engagement platform serving municipalities with ideation, consultation, and participatory budgeting modules. It is the closest commercial analog to Ethelo's eDemocracy and Citizen Budget offerings, targeting the same municipal and regional government buyers with a quote-based SaaS model.
• Bang the Table (EngagementHQ): Bang the Table's EngagementHQ is a subscription civic engagement suite used by hundreds of councils globally for consultation, surveys, and place-based deliberation. It targets the same local-government segment as Ethelo with a comparable sales-led enterprise motion.
• Decidim: Decidim is an open-source participatory democracy platform used by cities and governments to run assemblies, consultations, and budget processes. It competes head-to-head with Ethelo's eDemocracy offering in the public sector, with the key difference being its open-source license and large contributor community.
• MetroQuest: MetroQuest is a public engagement SaaS specialized in interactive planning, transportation, and infrastructure consultations for municipal and regional governments. It targets the same infrastructure and land-use planning use cases as several of Ethelo's case studies (e.g., Metro Vancouver Mobility Pricing, capital planning).

Broad incumbents

• SurveyMonkey (Momentive): SurveyMonkey is a broad survey and market insights platform used by public sector, non-profit, and enterprise customers to collect stakeholder input. It is a weaker functional analog to Ethelo's deliberation engine but a frequent procurement incumbent for basic civic engagement use cases.
• Qualtrics: Qualtrics is the incumbent experience management platform, offering survey, analytics, and stakeholder feedback capabilities used by governments and large enterprises. While not focused on deliberation, it is the most common incumbent Ethelo is evaluated against in public-sector procurement, and it is rapidly adding decision-support features.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/Ethelo
• Facebookfacebook.com/EtheloDecisions
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/ethelo

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A1 record

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about ETHELO DECISIONS