Data Quantity on Contracts Finder: The Long View.
Covid-19 has shown us the importance of transparency in procurement. A transparent process allows suppliers and buyers to clearly identify each other, and set benchmarks on how others are buying and selling.
Contracts Finder has made great strides in facilitating this transparency over recent years. The Public Contracts Regulations 2015, an Act of Parliament, established the existence ...
Data Works: Creating Machine Learning Models For Categorisation
-Ian Makgill, Founder Spend Network
We're working hard on a new set of machine learning models for categorisation. It has proven to be really challenging.
Developing an accurate categorisation for all our data is our ultimate goal. At the moment, some records have classifications, some do not. Some of the records with classifications aren't correct.
We want our users ...
Details Matter FT.com
Last week, we had an article featured in the Financial Times.
Working with their team is always fantastic.
They cut through to the issues and need to know that everything is right.
The night before publishing, we were discussing one of the figures "Was it safe to say that Hesse really spent €700m on masks?"
Yes, and no.
The original notice ...
Why Beneficial Ownership Data Should Interest You.
The Beneficial Ownership Data Standard (BODS) is an open data standard for publishing data on company ownership and control. You can find out more about the standard and the initiative to publish BODS data here.
Over 80 countries are already committed to using the standard, so we can expect to see more of this data in the ...
Which Country’s Purchasing Changed the Most During the Covid-19 Crisis?
Looking at the data on tenders over the past twelve months gives some insight into the ways that different governments are operating during the crisis. Looking at the twelve largest economies in Europe, we've been able to see how buyers have changed their buying practices since the start of the year.
From the chart above it is ...
Implementing procurement analytics? Start with service design.
-Ian Makgill, Founder, Spend Network
If you're unsure what service design is, a good place to start is here . It's a fascinating area of business that is concerned with making sure that services meet the needs of users. A good example of service design at work is Amazon. Amazon has a website, but this is only ...
5 Steps To Tackle Public Procurement Corruption.
Governments have rightly relaxed procurement rules in order to act quickly on Covid-19, but stories already abound on alleged corruption and financial mismanagement.
For instance, there are the tests that don't work , the ventilators that never materialised, the PPE that failed to arrive, and the Health Minister who was sacked. What's telling, is that these were ...
Your supplier is on mute.
Does video conferencing make it easier to evaluate suppliers?
We're just finishing up a bid. Our heads are full of equality policies, pricing and schedules. It's a strong bid, a great team and we've got all the necessary experience. It feels good.
We've written a lot, it has taken a long time, but could it be different?
It used ...
Do Governments Want to Trade with Small Business?
Why Covid-19 should change Government's view of contracting with SMEs.
-By Ian Makgill, Founder, Spend Network.
In April the Government awarded a £108m contract to Crisp Websites Limited, trading as Pestfix (https://www.pestfix.co.uk) a small, family-owned firm in Littlehampton, West Sussex for the supply of PPE. At the time of the award, Pestfix had little or no trading history ...
The Case For Using Data In Public Procurement
Our current model of procurement uses data for limited purposes. The primary analysis conducted by procurement teams is spend analysis, where buyers seek to identify opportunities for aggregating demand. Aggregation is where a buyer purchases more goods or services from a single supplier in order to achieve price reductions. In the public sector, spend analysis typically ...
Tackling Covid-19 with open procurement data
To help public sector buyers around the world combat the Covid-19 emergency, we have built our supplier search tool (http://openopps.com/covid-19).
Our free service allows buyers to search for suppliers around the world that provide critical goods and services. By searching for a particular term, such as ‘PPE’ or ‘protective equipment’, users can be instantly connected to a ...
Public procurement data needs work.
Government data is much like infrastructure, valuable when it is cared for, troublesome when it is left unloved.
Government spends nearly £400bn a year with suppliers, but most of this data is only available to the buyers and their suppliers. This is fine for managing individual contracts, but it is no good if you want to manage ...
New OJEU Procurement Thresholds for 2020
The Government has recently updated the procurement thresholds for public sector procurement processes for 2020. We outline what this means for you and your business.
When does this take place?
The updated thresholds for public procurement will affect new procurement processes from 1st January 2020 to 31st December 2020
Does Brexit affect this?
Yes and no. From 31st January 2020, ...
A free hand or a free market? How competitive is public procurement in Europe? Part three of a three part series
This article is the last of a three part series on competitive tendering in public procurement in Europe. We have already learned that European tendering is positive in some aspects (amount of time given to respond) and less positive in others (provision of information to bidders). In this article, we’ll be looking at the number of ...
A free hand or a free market? How competitive is public procurement in Europe? Part two of a three part series
This article is the second part of a three part series on competitive tendering in public procurement in Europe. There is a correlation between competitive tendering in public procurement and value for money as well as broader, positive procurement outcomes (e.g. contract completion on time, in full). As before, data was extracted from Tenders Electronic Daily ...