Public procurement notice: Prior Information Notice Without Call For Competition
Published: 2021-05-26
Buyer: Kilpailu-ja kuluttajavirasto
Country: FI
Contract type: Supplies
CPV classification: 48000000 | 72000000 | 72261000: Software support services | 72263000: Software implementation services | 72268000: Software supply services

Technical requirements: This notification is only an EU prior information notice. This notification is not a preliminary notice to reduce the time period for tenders. Neither is this a tendering request, procurement notice or an invitation to a negotiated procedure. Hence, the contracting authority does not request any offers or tenders by this notification. The aim is to give out information regarding the needs of the contracting authority and at the same time request information on the same subject-matter. This notification and/or answering to it do not create any obligations for the contracting authority or for those who choose to answer to it.
The contracting authority has the option of having a dialogue with potential tenderers. This dialogue can be e.g. about the technical specifications of the procurement. This information notice is to start such dialogue.
The information provided by the contracting authority is preliminary and it is subject to change. The contracting authority has no obligation to make changes to the materials provided and the contracting authority makes the final decision on what the procurement material shall contain. The contracting authority is not obliged to make the procurement described in this information notice.
Not taking part in this dialogue will not prevent any actors from later participating in the procurement itself. Taking or not taking part in the dialogue does not change the standing or status of a company in the procurement process.
To get the questionnaire and the form with which we ask the answers to be given, please send an email to FIT-hankinta@kkv.fi and we will provide you with the material. Please use ‘FIT procurement’ in the title of the email. We kindly ask that you send your answers and any additional material to: FIT-hankinta@kkv.fi. Please note that the limit for what we can receive is 50 MB.
Interested parties are kindly requested to answer the provided questions and inform us whether you wish to demo and/or present your solution. We kindly ask you to answer before 12 p.m. 7 June 2021 (UTC +3). Answers are asked to be provided either in Finnish or English.
Provider specific demo/presentation sessions are planned to be held starting from week 24 via Teams-conference calls. We will use the contact information provided to make the arrangements for these sessions. The contracting authority does not commit to having more detailed discussions/presentation sessions with all interested parties.
The Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority (FCCA) is tasked with ensuring good market performance. The competition division removes barriers to competition, ensuring that consumers are offered competitive alternatives. The consumer division, on the other hand, ensures that consumers have access to sufficient, accurate, and truthful information for making choices, and that the practices companies use in marketing and their customer relations are appropriate and the contract terms applied by them are reasonable.
Further information concerning the contracting authority and especially the competition division can be found from our web page. Relevant information can be found from: https://www.kkv.fi/en/facts-and-advice/competition-affairs/
The FCCA has a need to maintain its capabilities in its case handling and is preparing to start a procurement process. This project goes by the name ‘Forensic Analysis Research Tool’. The initial subject-matter of the procurement is described here. Please note that this contains the initial needs of the contracting authority. These needs and information provided are subject to change. This is part of a market consultation, which aims to further increase the knowledge of the contracting authority.
The contracting authority and mainly its competition division has multiple cases in which the contracting authority investigates suspected competition infringements and uses a software (hereinafter also ‘product’) to analyse tens, if not hundreds of gigabytes worth of files as evidence. The product is used to analyse the material and at the same time maintain the integrity of it. It is vital that this work can be done simultaneously by multiple users and this requirement applies to individual cases, i.e. multiple users must be able to go through the material of the same case simultaneously, while making markings to the material.
Most of the users of the product are either lawyers or economists, whose IT skills vary. Hence the typical user of the product is not a forensic researcher per se. Therefore, the contracting authority values and is looking for simple-to-use product, which the case handlers can effectively use to make judicial evaluations based on the material.
Many of the cases are at or are about to be taken to court. During court proceedings it is vital to be able to meet critical deadlines. Because of this, the abovementioned need for simultaneous working on the same case is of utmost importance. The contracting authority foresees that cases with massive amounts of data will not decrease over time. Furthermore, the contracting authority considers it possible that the product could be used during dawn raids. During dawn raids the contracting authority has even more data to comb through to determine which of the materials should be kept for further analysis.
The contracting authority has its own operating environment (server) for the product. The contracting authority will use this operating environment. Hence the subject-matter of the procurement is not the hardware required for the operating environment, not even partially. Any questions in relation to the requirements for the operating environment are made solely to be able to determine, whether a separate procurement is needed.
The contracting authority seeks an off-the-shelf product with useful features with which the case handlers can inter alia mark or tag individual files, exclude files, use efficient searches, investigate items from a relevant time period, find correlations within the material and share the workload with other case handlers. The product must functionally support the principles of Forensic IT and thereby ensure that the files handled by the product will maintain their origin and authenticity. For the use of the subsequent processing phase the product must have the capacity to process, index and analyse large amounts of data (up to several Terabytes) as well as document these in order for the data to be used as evidence in court.