Can Anyone Do Business With Government?

By Fiona Hunt

It’s understandable that for many SME’s, doing business with government is not high on their prospecting list. In the media, most of the coverage around government suppliers tends to be about big consultancies and major multinational technology companies. It’s understandable then that many smaller businesses would consider becoming a supplier to government highly unlikely.

The good news is that it is possible for businesses of all sizes to become a supplier to government, and Spend Network has created the freely available OpenOpps platform to help all businesses access government buying contracts and tenders easily.

Where Do You Start?

OpenOpps is a database of all openly published contracts and tenders released by governments. It’s fully searchable by category and it’s easy to set up an alert that is tailored to your industry and category and delivered daily to your inbox. The database will supply you with the details for the contract, and often provides a direct link to the buying department or division.

Can OpenOpps Help Me Do Business Internationally?

In short, yes. The strength of the Spend Network data is that it accesses procurement and contracting opportunities from over 150 countries. The Insights feature gives further details to help your bids, including how the market functions, who are the key competing suppliers, and when contracts are coming up for renewal.

Opportunities to supply to government are available to all businesses, and with the recent release of new procurement measures to include social value, SME’s are now better placed than ever to provide compelling supply bids to governments in the UK and internationally.

For more help on how to do more business with government,

Photo by Joshua Ness