Public procurement notice: Voluntary Ex Ante Transparency Notice
Published: 2020-03-20
Buyer: Cheshire East Borough Council
Country: UK
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Negotiated without a prior call for competition
CPV classification: 72000000
Estimated value: 1100000 GBP

Technical requirements: Υπηρεσίες τεχνολογίας των πληροφοριών: παροχή συμβουλών, ανάπτυξη λογισμικού, Διαδίκτυο και υποστήριξη
Provision of Oracle Service Contract — Oracle E-business Suite (EBS) and Database Technical Support Services. Ref: W964
To provide on going support and maintenance of the Oracle E-business Suite (EBS) for Cheshire East BC and Cheshire West and Chester BC.
This is a joint procurement by Cheshire East Borough Council on behalf of Cheshire East Borough Council and Cheshire West and Chester Borough Council pursuant to Article 32(2)(b) of Directive 2014/24/EU) for support and maintenance of the joint Oracle E-business Suite (EBS) and database with technical support services for 12 months with an option to extend for 12 months.
This is a joint procurement on behalf of Cheshire East Borough Council and Cheshire West and Chester Borough Council (the Councils) pursuant to Regulation 32(2) of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (the Regulations). Regulation 32(2)(b) of the Regulations permit the use of the negotiated procedure without prior publication where the works, supplies or services can only be supplied by a particular economic operator:
A project is underway to replace the current Oracle ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) System eBusiness Suite with a new system, business world. The go-live of business world has been delayed which necessitates the Oracle solution to remain operational in 20/21 and potentially in 21/22.
The core system supports all business processes for financial accounting, income to cash, HRMS, Payroll, procure to pay, time recording, performance monitoring, learning management and statutory reporting. eBS provides the repository for all relevant data for submission to external agencies such as HMRC and for the official end of year published accounts for all associated bodies. In addition, there are over 55 inward/outward bound interfaces/data provision facilities to and from internal and external systems.
The technical support service agreement encompasses the provision of support for eBS and the underlying Oracle databases — critical in maintaining production services to the associated bodies – along with software updates and upgrades made available to clients in a timely manner. These include statutory payroll processes such as end of year/start of year tax changes, local government pension scheme, and real time information for collection by HMRC. Critical patches supply the latest updates to provide system security.
The Councils therefore require ongoing support and maintenance services from Oracle for 12 months plus and option to extend for a further 12 months. Due to ownership of intellectual property rights of the Oracle ERP system the support and maintenance services are not available from any other economic operators. Consequently regulation 32(2)(b) the negotiated procedure without prior publication applies and may be used to enable the procurement of the support and maintenance services from Oracle.
Cheshire East Borough Council will incorporate a standstill period at the point that the information of the contract is communicated to tenderers. That notification will provide full information on the award decision. The standstill period, which will be for a minimum of 10 calendar days, provides time for unsuccessful tenderers to challenge the award decision before the contract is entered into. The Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (SINº 102 provides for aggrieved parties who have been harmed or are at risk of harm by a breach of the rules total action in the High Court (England, Wales and Northern Ireland).


Winner: Oracle Corporation UK Ltd
Award value: 1100000