Public procurement notice: Voluntary Ex Ante Transparency Notice
Published: 2020-03-10
Buyer: Ministry of Defence, DE&S Mat Strat, DE&S Mat Strat
Country: UK
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Contract award without prior publication
CPV classification: 72261000: Software support services
Estimated value: 1400000 GBP

Technical requirements: Single source for the provision of support and maintenance to the extant enterprise Active Risk Manager tool for 2 years from 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2022.
1 year plus 1 year option for maintenance/support, exist plan, visual learning and interactive training.
The authority intends to award a contract to SWORD AR Ltd for support and maintenance of Active Risk Manager tool. The duration of the contract will be for 2 years from 1 April 2020 with two 1 year options.
It is considered that this contract can be placed using the negotiated procedure without prior publication of a contract notice pursuant to Directive 2009/81/EC article 28 (1) (e) (Regulation 16(1)(a)(ii) of the UK Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011) for technical reasons. The support to the current software tool can only be provided by SWORD AR the extant Active Risk Manager (ARM) supplier by virtue of specific technical knowledge. The ARM Risk tool is a complex configuration containing bespoke structured query language database, its configuration data language is not available from other suppliers due to SWORD AR owning the Active Risk Management tool and source code. The expertise and unique knowledge necessary to undertake the support and maintenance contract lies only with SWORD AR as they own and have developed the software. The authority considers that such capabilities, skills and processes could not be replicated by any other party. Software updates, security patches, software bug fixes and ongoing configuration can only be made to ARM by SWORD AR. These ongoing security accreditation requirements and to maintain viability of the software’s evolving installation are subsequently only available from SWORD AR. No other supplier would be able to continue to support and maintain the tool in light of the above and ensure there is no interruption to service which would produce significant risk to the authority.
Please note this contract is yet to be awarded, this VTN remains open until 12.00 on the 20 March 2020.
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.
Advertising Regime OJEU: 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: SWORD AR
Award value: 1400000