Selling to public institutions in Denmark
Danish public institutions are among the most law-abiding and least corrupt in the world. With almost no exceptions civil servants in Denmark follow the rules and regulations. This is particularly true when it comes to procurement. For a newcomer to the Danish public market that is generally a good thing.
As a newcomer and/or foreign company the chance of winning tenders is good. The playing field is generally level and ‘the rules of the game’, when bidding in Denmark are transparent.
Some tenders are published in Danish and that can be a challenge. The challenge can be overcome, but the signal inherent in this should be noted. It is a strong signal that the procurer is either not aware of relevant international suppliers, or, has a strong preference for a Danish supplier or supplier with a strong Danish presence.
Identifying opportunities
The procurement pattern of the Danish public sector is characterised by being fairly centralised and highly organised – particularly in the areas of IT, Healthcare and defence.
Multiple procurement entities do exist but the size of Denmark, the high level of digitisation, a general Danish aptitude and stride for efficiency and cooperation and general high level of organisation in the Danish public sector, means that cooperation and centralisation of buying is very common.
A number of organisations such as SKI A/S (Broad framework agreements for all public organisations), FMI (Defence), KOMBIT (major IT-developments for councils) and the five regional authorities (procurement for hospitals) are responsible for a large part or all of the procurement in a given sector.
So in addition to general surveillance of upcoming and published tender, special attention should therefore be paid to these organisations. What are their strategies, patterns, needs and procurement plans?
Bidding for contracts in Denmark
As for all EU-countries small contracts can be awarded directly to a supplier. (In Denmark the limit for this is 500.000 DKK.) Once you get over this limit competitive bidding or EU-tendering is required.
While all European countries must abide by European law on procurement and thresholds for tendering etc. the actual implementation and interpretation varies from country to country. Hence, what is acceptable and good strategi and practice when bidding in another country may not work in Denmark. Secondly, in Denmark a number of very specific ‘traditions’, with regards to how tender material and evaluation models are designed, have evolved.
Danish public procures are generally apt at choosing procurement processes, open tenders, restricted tenders, tenders with negotiations, dynamic procurement systems and framework agreements. All of them can come into play and the strategies for winning them are different.
Winning tender in Denmark requires therefor in our experience knowledge, commitment, experience, and hard work.
Tenbid has for a number of years helped Danish and foreign companies win tenders in Denmark. We know how to make sure that you your bid is the best it can be – if you want to bid. We say that because decisions to bid should not be taken lightly. We want to help you bid but first we want to go through the following analysis:
- Can we bid?
- Do we really want to bid?
- Do we really think we can win the bid?
- How do we bid to win?
Skipping this process simply risks wasting time, focus and money. That is not in your interest and if it is not in your interest, it is not ours either.
If you want to learn more about how we can help you, please do get in contact. We are always happy share two cups of coffee – virtually or face-to-face to get you started.
The management team
Tenbid Consulting is a partner-based consultancy company run by a former head of IT-procurement at the Danish national procurement agency (SKI A/S).
The partner in charge is:
- Morten T. Pedersen, Managing Partner, M.Sc.
Between us, we have more than 30 years of experience within public sales and tenders; we have processed more than 100 public tenders and helped more than 50 tenderers. We are not lawyers; we are tender consultants and business developers/sales people.
Our winning approach
Tenbid Consulting’s unique expertise in the area stems from two things. 1. We have years and years of experience in the Danish market. 2. We work on tenders as well so we know both sides of the table and therefore knows the counterpart’s perspective as well. We work for both the public sector and for the private vendors wishing to sell to the public sector in Denmark. – Though obviously not on the same bid.
Our core competencies are as follows:
Public Organizations:
- Project management of public tenders
- Consultancy regarding public framework agreements and the use of them, e.g SKI agreements
- Help/sparring regarding procurement strategies and policies
- Contract management
- Matchmaking of public customers to private vendors
Courses and generel consultancy within the area of public procurement and tenders
Vendors:
- Bid management and the writing of proposals on public tenders and complex solutions
- Public Sales strategy/go-to-market strategy
- Up-sale on framework agreements, e.g. SKI agreements
- ”Matchmaking” of private vendors to public customers
- Courses and generel consultancy within the area of public sales and tenders
A typically project for us could be that a municipality wants us to make their entire tender structure on a certain area, e.g. procurement of an IT system or a welfare technology solution.
Our typical task is on behalf of the municipality to make/develop the tender conditions, scope of work, obligations etc.
Then we design the entire tender material based on the business needs of the municipality. This typically includes establishing the evaluation criterias and delivering to the municipality an evaluation report who points out the winner of the tender. Sometimes we also help the municipality with the contracting.
The other part of our customer base is the private vendors who either want to make a proposal on a specific Danish public tender, typically an already announced tender, or more generally to get better at selling to the public sector.
Any questions or requests?