Public procurement notice: Voluntary Ex Ante Transparency Notice
Published: 2018-09-08
Buyer: Ministry of Defence, Weapons, Defence General Munitions (DGM) Project Team
Country: UK
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Negotiated without a prior call for competition
CPV classification: 35300000: Weapons, ammunition and associated parts
Estimated value: 2556339 GBP
EU fund: ESF

Technical requirements: The Defence General Munitions Team, part of UK Ministry of Defence (MoD), intends to place a Contract DGM/1920 for supply of 5,56 mm Reduced Ricochet Light Penetration (RRLP) provided by Edgar Brothers.
The duration of the contract will be for a 1 year buy, with 2 years of options for additional supply.
It is considered that this requirement can be placed using the Non-Competitive Negotiated Procedure pursuant to Article 28(1)(e) of Directive 2009/81/EC (Regulation 16(1)(a)(ii) of the Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011). This is for technical reasons.
The RRLP solution provided by Edgar Brothers is the current in-service capability used by the UK MoD. It is the only Safe and suitable for service (S3) qualified solution for use in training and on operations that meets the user requirement.
The duration of the contract will be for a 1 year buy, with 2 years of options for additional supply.
The Defence General Munitions Team, part of UK Ministry of Defence (MoD), intends to place a Contract DGM/1920 for supply of 5.56mm Reduced Ricochet Light Penetration (RRLP) provided by Edgar Brothers.
The duration of the contract will be for a 1 year buy, with 2 years of options for additional supply.
It is considered that this requirement can be placed using the Non-Competitive Negotiated Procedure pursuant to Article 28(1)(e) of Directive 2009/81/EC (Regulation 16(1)(a)(ii) of the Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011). This is for technical reasons.
The RRLP solution provided by Edgar Brothers is the current in-service capability used by the UK MoD. It is the only Safe and suitable for service (S3) qualified solution for use in training and on operations that meets the user requirement.
The UK MoD must ensure ammunition brought into service is Safe and suitable for service, this involves extensive testing and/or review of submitted evidence from potential manufacturers which demonstrates the performance and safety of the ammunition to meet the requirement. S3 testing can take 12 – 24 months to complete.
If any ammunition other than Edgar Brothers provided solution was procured, it would need to meet the user requirement and be subject to qualification. This would result in the user being unable to utilise the new munition on training or operations until qualification was complete, resulting in a capability gap as the current stockpile would have expended.
Given the high probability of a capability gap due to an expended stockpile, it is considered that the technical and safety risk to the user of a replacement in the interim is too great to be acceptable. For strict technical impracticability, there are no other suppliers that can meet the MoD’s ammunition requirement in the interim. The MOD intends to run a competitive tender exercise for the longer term 5,56 mm Light Penetration requirement in financial year 19/20.
The Authority reserves the right to amend any condition related to security of information to reflect any changes in national law or government policy. If any contract documents are accompanied by instructions on safeguarding classified information (e.g. a Security Aspects Letter), the Authority reserves the right to amend the terms of these instructions to reflect any changes in national law or government policy, whether in respect of the applicable protective marking scheme, specific protective markings given, the aspects to which any protective marking applies, or otherwise. The link below to the Gov.uk website provides information on the Government Security Classification.
— This contract opportunity is published in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU),the MoD Defence Contracts Bulletin and www.contracts.mod.uk


Winner: Edgar Brothers
Award value: 2556339