Section one: Contracting authority
one.1) Name and addresses
Department for International Trade
London
Country
United Kingdom
NUTS code
UK - United Kingdom
Internet address(es)
Main address
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-international-trade
one.3) Communication
Additional information can be obtained from the above-mentioned address
one.4) Type of the contracting authority
Ministry or any other national or federal authority
one.5) Main activity
Economic and financial affairs
Section two: Object
two.1) Scope of the procurement
two.1.1) Title
DIT Services
two.1.2) Main CPV code
- 79900000 - Miscellaneous business and business-related services
two.1.3) Type of contract
Services
two.1.4) Short description
The Department for International Trade (DIT) has the objective of creating a UK that leads the way on achieving fair global trading, drives economic growth and improves the living standards in the country and around the world. We will deliver that through attracting and retaining inward investment, promoting exports and delivering new trade deals.
Our vision for Investment is to transform DIT into one of the world’s most capable and respected investment promotion agencies, best placed to deliver high-value inward investment in support of the Government’s economic ambitions including innovation, net zero and levelling up. We will achieve this through optimising our support to high-value, high impact investors, whilst growing effective and efficient services across all investor categories.
We will deliver this vision through our talented and diverse teams across the UK, including our Trade and Investment Hubs, and in 108 countries around the world. The department, including the Office for Investment, will work in lockstep with colleagues from across HM Governments departments, local government, the Devolved Administrations, businesses, civil society and partners around the world.
DIT is seeking a strategic partner to help us improve our ability to target and support high-value investment, and to supplement what we know from our interactions with businesses with external intelligence, to inform policy making on enhancing the attractiveness of the UK investment environment. This will involve delivering business intelligence, training, research, analysis and broader support to client-facing teams to increase their impact with investors. This will require expertise, innovation, operational excellence and a commitment from the provider to deliver in the national interest.
The successful bidder will help DIT maintain its position as one of the world’s preeminent investment promotion organisations. They will provide support that will increase the credibility and impact of our investor interactions—and help us secure higher levels of inward investment benefiting all regions and nations of the UK.
This Prior Information Notice is being issued solely for the purposes of conducting market engagement and it is not a Contract Notice or a commitment to buy. Following pre-market engagement to test our initial hypotheses for developing our service offer to investors in summer 2021, we have iterated proposals and included further details on the proposed activities that the supplier will be expected to deliver. We aim to work alongside the provider to deliver comprehensive, holistic support that Government is uniquely best placed to provide.
two.1.5) Estimated total value
Value excluding VAT: £10,000,000
two.1.6) Information about lots
This contract is divided into lots: No
two.2) Description
two.2.2) Additional CPV code(s)
- 79990000 - Miscellaneous business-related services
two.2.3) Place of performance
NUTS codes
- UK - United Kingdom
two.2.4) Description of the procurement
DIT is looking to procure the following categories of services, many of which are currently provided by an outsourced provider. Bids from potential suppliers are expected to include the following service requirements however, we invite bidders to offer creative solutions when seeking to meet these requirements.
1. Training: DIT requires a service that provides a high-quality and engaging learning and development (L&D) programme to DIT investment staff in the UK and overseas, enabling them to deliver on DIT investment priorities more effectively. This L&D programme will build staff’s investment knowledge, develop their investment promotion and account management skills and share best practice from within DIT but also other investment promotion agencies.
2. Research and analysis: DIT requires material to address specific knowledge gaps which exist within the department’s network. The information requested will often be highly specific and require sector and/or regional expertise, examples could include the AgriTech sector in Wales or aquafarming in the South West.
3. Client-facing support material: DIT requires support material for client-facing teams across its network to manage investment prospects both domestically and internationally. This material will contain packaged client pitches or ‘propositions’ and investor-facing content to allow teams to present opportunities to prospective investors on a particular region, economic cluster, or sector as well as opportunities relating to capital investments and freeports. This material will also allow client-facing teams to self-serve in answering specialist questions from investors and provide content for the investor self-serve portal. In the long term this service will develop a bank of high-quality “off-the-shelf” information and materials to service common queries or details on priority opportunities which will assist in managing demand for bespoke requests. The volumes required will vary depending on the needs of the network at any given time.
4. Market insights: DIT requires a service which allows it to keep abreast of industry trends to influence prioritisation of our promotion efforts. This will require a granular and intelligent approach to tracking data, with an emphasis on industry information that provides early signalling of trends as well as the longer-term macroeconomic analyses typical in ‘pure’ policymaking. This will enable us to respond to specific opportunities and threats and, ideally, inform our account management interactions with investors.
5. Modelling and benchmarking tools: DIT requires a suit of information tools to allow its staff to produce reports highlighting the potential of the UK as an investment destination. These will include financial modelling and benchmarking tools which are able to compare indicative financial performances of investments projects across a range of investments locations.
6. Subject matter expert support: DIT requires a service which allows quick and easy access to subject matter experts to work with DIT staff on specific internal or client-facing projects. This could include detailed research to support changes or improvements to DIT’s service offer or supporting DIT teams in assisting high value clients with investment proposals. These experts will be scoped on a case-by-case basis and handled as a contract change notice using a pre-agreed rate card. This service allows DIT to be responsive to the needs of its network and clients enabling the efficient onboarding of experts to work on projects of high importance.
7. Target generation: DIT requires a service which generates FDI leads for both its network staff both domestically and overseas.
The estimated value is £7,000,000 - 10,000,000 for the whole duration of the contract. Contract award is expected to be made in Q4 FY22/23.
two.2.14) Additional information
The market engagement will consist of a webinar on 27 April 2022 followed by one-to-one meetings with interested organisations until 10 May 2022.
To register your interest and receive an invite to the Webinar, please notify DIT by sending an email to commercialbpo@trade.gov.uk. You will need to sign an NDA agreement to join the webinar, which will be sent to you upon expressing interest.
two.3) Estimated date of publication of contract notice
15 September 2022
Section four. Procedure
four.1) Description
four.1.8) Information about the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA)
The procurement is covered by the Government Procurement Agreement: Yes