Excelsior Pass

The Excelsior Pass is an American vaccine passport program in operation in the State of New York. It it officially described as a “secure, digital proof of COVID-19 vaccination or negative test results.”¹⁾

It was developed in partnership with IBM, built on top of their IBM Digital Health Pass.^{2) 3)}

Work on what became the Excelsior Pass began in September 2019.⁴⁾

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo first announced the Excelsior Pass during his 2021 “State of the State” address on January 10, 2021.⁵⁾

On March 2, 2021, Cuomo announced the launch of a pilot program to test out the new passport program at Madison Square Garden and Barclays Center.⁶⁾ The app was then officially launched to the wider public on March 26, 2021.⁷⁾

A three-year development contract for the application was signed between the New York State Office of Information Technology Services and IBM on June 24, 2021.⁸⁾ The New York Times reported that the true cost of the project was much higher than originally proposed, for a likely total of $17 million over three years. Further, the outlet revealed that the Excelsior Pass was designed to contain more personal information than just vaccine status, including other health data and driver's license.⁹⁾ A followup report increased the estimate to $27 million.¹⁰⁾

On August 5, 2021, Cuomo announced the introduction of the “Excelsior Pass Plus” which would expand the program into other states and internationally.¹¹⁾ The expansion connected the Excelsior Pass to the SMART Health Card Framework developed by the Vaccine Credential Initiative (VCI), and VeriFLY by Daon.¹²⁾

New York City began enforcing its mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy for indoor businesses on September 13, 2021.¹³⁾

On May 14, 2023, the Times Union reported that the cost of the project had reached $64 million, which included payments to IBM and two consultants on the project, Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Deloitte.¹⁴⁾

The Excelsior Pass initially offered three different types of pass:¹⁵⁾

• COVID-19 Vaccination Pass (valid for 180 days after the final dose of the vaccine was administered, at which time a new Pass may be retrieved)
• COVID-19 PCR Test Pass (valid until midnight on the third day after a test)
• COVID-19 Antigen Test Pass (valid for 6 hours from the time of a test)

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