Scope
Description
The Authority intends to direct award a contract for the continued provision and enhancement of its Geographic Information System (GIS) platform. This contract is critical to supporting statutory services, operational workflows, and strategic IT objectives. The estimated value of the contract is £1.5m over a 10-year contract, consisting of a 5-year core term and 5 years of optional extension periods. The incumbent supplier has been identified as the only viable provider capable of meeting all mandatory requirements under a single contract.
Contract 1. Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
Supplier
Contract value
- £1,500,000 excluding VAT
- £1,800,000 including VAT
Above the relevant threshold
Earliest date the contract will be signed
9 January 2026
Contract dates (estimated)
- 12 January 2026 to 11 January 2031
- Possible extension to 11 January 2036
- 10 years
Description of possible extension:
The optional extension periods will be subject to the negotiation of the contract terms. The total extension period will be 5-years, likely structured as an optional +3 year extension followed by an optional +2 year extension.
Main procurement category
Services
CPV classifications
- 72000000 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support
- 48000000 - Software package and information systems
- 38221000 - Geographic information systems (GIS or equivalent)
Contract locations
- UKK3 - Cornwall and Isles of Scilly
Other information
Description of risks to contract performance
The following risks have been identified as potentially jeopardising the satisfactory performance of the contract. These risks are based on findings from the market engagement exercise and strategic assessments. They will inform the negotiation of contract terms and may be used to justify future contract modifications, if necessary.
1. Technical Incompatibility Risk
Risk: Transitioning to a new supplier would introduce significant technical incompatibilities with existing systems, workflows, and integrations (e.g. Microsoft Entra SSO, MFA, TypeScript SDKs).
Mitigation: The incumbent supplier's platform is already fully integrated and compatible with the Authority's IT environment, ensuring seamless continuity and avoiding costly reengineering efforts.
2. Service Disruption Risk
Risk: A change in supplier could disrupt statutory services such as planning, building control, land charges, and waste management due to lack of platform familiarity and integration.
Mitigation: The incumbent's platform is embedded in operational workflows and supports critical services. Continued use ensures uninterrupted service delivery.
3. Implementation and Migration Risk
Risk: Alternative suppliers lack proven experience in deploying GIS solutions at a scale and complexity comparable to the Authority's requirements. This increases the risk of failed or delayed implementation, particularly for cloud migration and enterprise integration.
Mitigation: The incumbent has a track record of successful deployments within UK public sector bodies. Their familiarity with the Authority's infrastructure reduces migration complexity and supports a smooth transition to cloud-hosted services.
4. Financial Risk
Risk: Competing solutions require substantial investment in development, migration, and retraining, with high uncertainty around actual costs and potential overruns.
Mitigation: The incumbent offers a quantifiable and affordable solution. Existing commercial arrangements and operational familiarity allow for predictable cost control and value for money.
5. Support and Maintenance Risk
Risk: Suppliers relying on third-party open-source components may not provide adequate support, security assurance, or contractual accountability.
Mitigation: The incumbent provides comprehensive technical support and maintains full contractual responsibility for platform performance, security, and updates.
6. Operational Risk
Risk: Lack of integrated mobile working solutions and high-accuracy field data collection capabilities among alternative suppliers could impair frontline service delivery.
Mitigation: The incumbent's mobile solutions are already in use for services such as highway surveys and tree management, among others. Their continued use ensures operational efficiency and service continuity across multiple field-based functions.
7. Strategic Misalignment Risk
Risk: The time and resources required to build, implement, configure, and migrate to alternative platforms could jeopardise the Authority's strategic objective to close its datacentres and fully adopt cloud infrastructure by 2030.
Mitigation: The incumbent's SaaS offering supports cloud adoption and aligns with long-term IT policy, ensuring strategic continuity and timely delivery of infrastructure transformation goals.
8. Technical and Contractual Ambiguity Risk
Risk: Proposals from alternative suppliers lacked clarity on deliverables, licensing, and commercial liability. In addition, there was ambiguity regarding the maturity and readiness of certain platform elements and products, increasing the risk of underperformance or contractual disputes.
Mitigation: The incumbent's contract will be based on existing terms, updated to reflect the cloud-hosted model. This provides a stable foundation for negotiation and performance assurance, with clear accountability and proven product maturity.
Conflicts assessment prepared/revised
Yes
Procedure
Procedure type
Direct award
Direct award justification
- Additional or repeat goods, services or works - extension or partial replacement
- Single supplier - technical reasons
This direct award is made under Schedule 5 of the Procurement Act 2023, relying on the following clauses:
• Clause 6: Due to an absence of competition for technical reasons, only a particular supplier can supply the required services, and there are no reasonable alternatives.
• Clause 7: The contract concerns the supply of services by the existing supplier intended as an extension to existing services, where a change in supplier would result in incompatibility and disproportionate technical difficulties.
Market Engagement Findings
The Authority conducted a structured market engagement exercise to assess the availability of alternative suppliers capable of meeting its contract's GIS requirements. The incumbent's response demonstrated their ability to continue fulfilling all of the contract's mandatory and optional requirements. Responses from all the alternative suppliers revealed significant gaps in functionality, integration, and support capabilities. Key findings include:
• No alternative supplier could meet all mandatory requirements under a single contract.
• Several suppliers lacked integrated mobile working solutions, support for high-accuracy field data collection, and compatibility with existing workflows.
• Many solutions lacked compatibility with key enterprise requirements, such as Microsoft Entra Single Sign-On (SSO), multi-factor authentication (MFA), or support for TypeScript software development kits (SDKs).
• Several suppliers proposed only partial offerings, such as advisory or consultation services, without delivering a deployable platform or the essential products and features required within the solution.
• Implementation, migration and licencing costs were either significantly higher than the incumbent supplier's figures or they were based on an ambiguous scope of what was to be delivered.
• The proposed solutions that relied on third-party open-source software lacked sufficient assurance that the supplier could meet all mandatory contractual requirements. Additionally, they introduced ambiguity regarding contractual accountability and commercial liability for ongoing software security, support, and maintenance.
• Implementation and migration risks were elevated due to lack of familiarity, unclear licensing scopes, and absence of proven deployment experience.
Strategic and Commercial Rationale
The incumbent supplier is the market leader in GIS platforms with proven experience of deploying and supporting complex GIS systems across the UK public sector and in particular within larger/unitary local authorities. Their platform is already embedded within the Authority's operations and supports critical services such as:
• Mapping and spatial intelligence for public and partner organisations,
• Planning, building control, and land charges,
• Waste contract management and
• Customer services
The Authority is also utilizing the incumbent's mobile working solutions to deliver services such as highway surveys and tree management.
Mandatory contract requirements are either essential for continuity of statutory services, operational workflows or aligned with the Council's IT policies, including security and development standards.
Alternative suppliers do not offer a fully integrated GIS platform with professional-grade capabilities or comprehensive technical support. The incumbent supplier remains the only provider capable of delivering a seamless, secure, and cost-effective solution without incurring disproportionate risk or resource expenditure.
Additional Financial and Strategic Considerations
The Council, like most UK public organisations, is subject to challenging budget constraints and must adopt a risk-averse approach to procurement decisions. This financial context significantly limits the feasibility of pursuing alternative supplier proposals, particularly where no commercial or technical gains have been demonstrated.
The market engagement exercise revealed that alternative solutions would require substantial investment in development, implementation, migration, and retraining. These costs are not only prohibitive but also carry a high degree of uncertainty, with a risk that actual costs may exceed initial estimates. This poses a serious financial risk to the Authority, which may not have sufficient budgetary flexibility to accommodate such overruns or change control requirements.
In contrast, the incumbent supplier offers a quantifiable and affordable solution that ensures continuity of statutory and critical services. The Authority is confident that best value for money can be achieved through direct negotiation with the incumbent, leveraging existing commercial arrangements and operational familiarity.
Furthermore, the Authority's internal teams possess the necessary knowledge, experience, and skills to support and in some cases manage the transition from on-premise to cloud-hosted GIS services. This aligns with the Council's strategic objective to close its datacentres and fully adopt cloud infrastructure by 2030, ensuring long-term sustainability and compliance with IT policy.
Conclusion
Based on the outcomes of the market engagement and supplier assessments, the Authority concludes that a direct award is legally justified under Schedule 5 of the Procurement Act 2023. This approach ensures continuity of service, cost-efficiency, and technical compatibility, while avoiding disproportionate risk and resource burdens.
Supplier
ESRI (UK) Limited
- Public Procurement Organisation Number: PMLQ-6842-CHYG
Millennium House, 65 Walton Street
Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire
HP21 7QG
United Kingdom
Email: cinkpen@esriuk.com
Website: https://www.esriuk.com/en-gb/home
Region: UKJ13 - Buckinghamshire CC
Small or medium-sized enterprise (SME): No
Voluntary, community or social enterprise (VCSE): No
Contract 1. Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
Contracting authority
Cornwall Council
- Public Procurement Organisation Number: PYRH-9827-DWLP
County Hall
Truro
TR1 3AY
United Kingdom
Region: UKK30 - Cornwall and Isles of Scilly
Organisation type: Public authority - sub-central government