n a procurement portal created specifically for it. For example, the United Nations publishes its bids in the United Nations Global Marketplace. The World Bank has developed a new Application for companies to be able to monitor projects and related business opportunities financed by the Bank. The African Development Bank has its own Procurement Portal.
There is a variety of national and international organizations that offer tender services advertisements. For example, the Development Galway through the DG Market webpage or the International Trade Center through the Procurement Map. Also, many procuring organizations have an internal database of qualified or potential suppliers to whom they usually send the invitations for bids. It is important that you find out if such a database exists for each of your potential clients of interest.
Also, procurement authorities often award small contracts to pre-identified suppliers, without advertising or opening a competitive process (also called sole-sourcing or direct sourcing). These contracts, small in nature, are usually accessible to SMEs. In order to gain access to them, it is imperative that you to establish a trusting relationship with the procuring entity.
Finally, specialized SMEs can participate as members of a consortium formed by companies of different sizes and different areas of expertise. SMEs may also want to consider their participation as subcontractors of a prime or main contractor. This can be an effective way for you to gain experience with public procurement or procurement from large corporations. The work references that you obtain as a subcontractor will be useful in the future when you apply for contracts directly.
If you want to learn how to write a Partnership Agreement have a look at the following article.
The most commonly used procurement methods include:
• Open competitive bidding (national or international). Any potential supplier can participate in the procurement process. It consists of an invitation to any potential supplier to bid, followed by an evaluation process and a contract award. In some cases, there is an invitation to express interest (or a pre-qualification process) prior to the invitation to bid.
• Restricted bidding. Only invited firms are allowed to bid. It consists of an invitation to bid to a pre-identified list of firms, followed by an evaluation process and a contract award.
• Request for quotations. It can be public or restricted to a pre-identified list of firms (usually a minimum of three). In this case, the most important element is the price.
• Sole-sourcing [direct sourcing]. This is a non-competitive bidding process. The buyer solicit and negotiate with only one supplier, because there is a reason that justifies it (for example, if there is only one provider in the market that can supply the requested goods and services, in an emergency situation, when the use of this method represents a clear advantage over the use of a competitive method, or when the procurement is within the thresholds).
Procurement entities use different evaluation criteria, depending on what they are procuring. The method used should be clearly explained in the bidding documents.
There are four main evaluation methods:
• Quality- and Cost-Based Selection. This method takes into account both quality and cost as a percentage weight of each. For example, 70% quality and 30% cost. The proposal that offers the highest score based on the weights is selected. In most cases, technical and financial proposals must be sent in separate sealed envelopes. First, technical proposals are opened, evaluated and scored. Only the firms that achieve the minimum technical marks will have their financial proposal opened and evaluated.
• Quality Based Selection (QBS). The offer is selected on the basis of technical quality. The proposal with the highest technical score is selected. This method is normally used for very complex and highly important assignments for the organization (e.g. legal services). Once the technical proposal is selected, the buying authority negotiate