Winners of the National AI Challenge 2025 Announced
Jury selects LUMC (via its Cairelab) and the Police as the winners with the best AI use cases
Delft / The Hague, September 10, 2025 - KickstartAI and the AI Coalition for the Netherlands (AIC4NL) are today announcing the winners of the National AI Challenge 2025. Following a selection day where five finalists presented their cases, the LUMC (via its Cairelab) and the Police emerged as the winners.
The LUMC aims to develop an AI-powered solution that can generate structured wound reports from photos to ease the workload for nurses and improve the quality of care. The Police plans to develop an AI tool that clarifies complex environmental laws and helps investigators utilize all available legislation, enabling them to better hold polluters accountable.
A team of dedicated machine learning engineers from KickstartAI will now begin working to solve the winners' challenges with AI.
Winner reactions:
“We’re very happy to win this challenge! It gives us the chance to reduce the nurses’ administrative burden and really improve wound care,” says Albert Simonse, Nursing Information at the LUMC. “We hope that this solution becomes a standard support tool in the wound care process — available to every nurse, in every care setting.”
The Police shares the excitement. "I am very happy that we won! The fight against environmental crimes is finally starting to receive the attention it deserves. This AI tool will greatly help strengthen our capabilities, enabling us to take down the biggest environmental criminals faster and more decisively,” says Akmir Nikman, Senior Advisor at the Police.
Application process:
The National AI Challenge 2025 began on April 23, with the submission of use cases. The most promising entries met criteria such as tackling a concrete, relevant problem within the organization's core activities, creating societal impact (through a scalable solution), and having sufficient quality data for AI development.
Selection procedure:
Following a pre-selection stage, the top 5 candidates presented their cases to the jury on September 9, 2025. The finalists were the Municipality of The Hague, the Institute for Responsible Medication Use, Leiden University Medical Center (via its Cairelab), the Police, and Leiden University Medical Center (via the Emergency Department). An expert jury, chaired by Marelle van Beerschoten (founder and director of Digital Shapers), consisted of Janneke Niessen (founder and investor at CapitalT), Thomas Dohmen (Director AI Collaboration Center, Leiden University and Business Director ICAI), Thomas Faber (MT member, Digital Economy Directorate, Ministry of Economic Affairs), and Herman Kienhuis (co-founder of Curiosity and VC investor).
Marelle van Beerschoten, founder and director of Digital Shapers, and chair of the National AI Challenge jury: “I look back on the pitches with great enthusiasm! They were of high quality and emphasized the societal value that AI can perfectly support. I believe that we are becoming increasingly creative with what we can do with AI. May this be an inspiration for the rest of the Netherlands!”
Next steps:
In the coming months, a team of dedicated AI engineers from KickstartAI will develop advanced AI solutions for LUMC and the Police. The focus will be not only on building an advanced AI model and the software needed to integrate that model into the two organizations' current digital environments, but also on user-friendliness and user adoption. Notably, the insights gained from this process will be valuable for a wider audience and will contribute to the development and adoption of AI in the Netherlands. This will boost both innovation and productivity, strengthening the Netherlands' competitive position.
More information:
KickstartAI and AIC4NL both focus on promoting the development and application of AI in the Netherlands and have found each other as complementary partners with a shared mission to support the development and adoption of AI. As a first step in their collaboration, they launched the National AI Challenge 2024 for AIC4NL participants. This year’s National AI Challenge culminated in two winners. Interested parties can stay informed about the projects’ progress via the website and social media channels of KickstartAI and AIC4NL.
For editors:
About KickstartAI:
KickstartAI's mission is to accelerate the adoption of AI in the Netherlands. To achieve this, the organization collaborates with businesses and society to develop practical AI solutions for their most pressing challenges. With a rapidly growing community of over 7,500 data scientists, software engineers, and AI experts, KickstartAI brings together the pioneers in the field of AI in the Netherlands to exchange ideas, best practices, and knowledge, thereby stimulating AI talent in the country. The organization was founded by Ahold Delhaize, ING, KLM, and NS with the aim of giving the AI ecosystem in the Netherlands a boost.
Contact person: Anoek Eckhardt, anoek.eckhardt@kickstart.ai, Ioanna Lykiardopoulou ioanna.lykiardopoulou@kickstart.ai
About AIC4NL:
The AI Coalition for the Netherlands (AIC4NL) is the national public-private community dedicated to accelerating the responsible development and application of AI in the Netherlands. As the largest AI community in the Netherlands, we unite companies, knowledge institutions, and public organizations. Through a national network of AI hubs, we reach regional, national, and international players and collectively build a strong AI position for the Netherlands. We achieve this by working together concretely within our programs, including AiNed, the largest AI program in the Netherlands.
Contact person: Barbara Risselada communicatie@aic4nl.nl