competitive procedure with negotiation
For the last couple of years I have kept a rough track of how the use of the special procedures (ie those that have specific grounds for use) are being used. Here's the table including 2024: And here's the same data in a shiny graph: These
Procurement Directives Revision
The last big thinking piece I will be writing about the revision of the Directives is about questioning the need for secondary legislation at all in EU public procurement. The reason for that being that successive waves of Directives have failed in opening up the public procurement market so we
Procurement Directives Revision
Why do we have thresholds in public procurement? Why do they exist? This is an answer I tried to answer a couple of times in the past and was not particularly happy with the result (here and here). In short, we have them today because…we have always had them.
Competitiveness Compass
The Commission published yesterday its Competitiveness Compass, providing some details of the political outlook for the Commission in the next year or so. With the upcoming revision of the substantive procurement Directives it is unsurprising that procurement was included in the document. The revision of the Directives gets called out
protectionism
"Suppose that governments are the only buyers of a certain product. Each one wishes to encourage production in its own jurisdiction, and therefore lets it be known that a firm’s bid will be seriously considered only if the product is supplied from a local plant. There will then
Procurement Directives Revision
For the first entry into this series about rethinking the procurement Directives, I am starting with the choice of legislative instrument since it shapes all regulatory decisions contained within as well as (hopefully) their enforcement. With this proposed change I am not arguing that changing legislative instrument will magically solve
lowest price
I've recently come across this document commissioned (I think) by the EIC Forum analysing the legal issues affecting innovation in public procurement. While it is not a final report, there was a barrier mentioned here that attracted my attention: the preference for price only contracts in procurement. Time
conferences
In March and April I will be taking part in a couple of procurement related events. First off, the ERA annual procurement conference, to be held in Trier on March 20th and 21st. I have not visited Trier in many years and am very much looking forward to this one.
EU Commission
The Commission kickstarted late last year the process to revise the public procurement Directives from 2014, launching a call for evidence and public consultation to run until March 7th. While I am not optimistic about the outcome of the legislative process and where we may be headed in the regulation
electronic procurement
I've uploaded to SSRN yesterday the final version of a new paper on the evolution of electronic procurement under Directive 2014/24/EU. Here's the abstract: "Traditionally, public procurement has been conducted on paper without any formal involvement of technology or electronic features. In 2004,
Court of Justice
The CJEU laid down early this week a fairly important judgment on third country access to procurement. On case C-652/22 Kolin Inşaat Turizm Sanayi ve Ticaret the Court concluded that economic operators from third countries neither party to the GPA nor with whom the EU has a deal are
Procurement Directives Revision
A couple of weeks ago a little birdie told me the Commission wanted to get the ball rolling on the revision of the procurement legal framework within the first 100 days of its term. Well, looks like they want to hit the ground running with the evaluation of the current