EU Funding

The competitive procurement of software in private beneficiaries' projects

An approved grant is not spent like your own money: the software supplier is chosen through a documented procedure that an auditor may leaf through years later.

Northdan Soft is a software supplier, not a funding consultancy, and is not affiliated with any managing authority or development agency. Programme information is indicative — always check the conditions in the programme's official applicant guide.

After the financing contract is signed, a private beneficiary discovers a step they have never taken as an ordinary company: procuring the supplier is governed by a dedicated procurement procedure. In Romania the reference act for private beneficiaries is Order MFE no. 1284/2016, extended to the 2021-2027 cohesion funds by Order MFE no. 1354 of 30 March 2023, and it has two tracks. Below the value thresholds of art. 7(5) of Law 98/2016 the purchase is made directly, against supporting documents. At or above them the competitive procedure applies — publishing or sending out a specification, collecting several quotes, evaluating them against criteria announced in advance, and keeping a file that shows why the winner won. The threshold is read from the public-procurement law as in force on the date of the purchase, because it is revised periodically, and the estimated value may not be split into smaller contracts to stay under it. The point where these procedures most often fail is not formality but comparability: three quotes written in three different languages — one by modules, one by developer days, one with a single global price — cannot be put into the same grid, and the evaluation becomes contestable. That is where the quality of the request for quotation and the discipline of the bidders count. Northdan takes part in such selections as a bidder and always structures its offer on the beneficiary's specification: functionality by functionality, with itemised prices, staged deadlines and explicit warranty terms — an offer that can be compared, evaluated and archived without question marks.

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How we help

An offer mapped onto your specification

We answer point by point to the requirements in the request for quotation, in their order, with a price per chapter — evaluation becomes a direct comparison, not an interpretation.

Documents ready for the procurement file

The offer comes with identification details, validity, deadlines and full terms — the pieces the procedure file has to contain at any verification.

A draft contract aligned with the offer

After award we supply the draft contract with the same content as the winning offer — no new clauses slipped in between selection and signature, the classic source of findings.

The typical steps of a competitive procedure at private beneficiaries

The common skeleton, once the value puts the purchase above the direct-purchase threshold: the beneficiary drafts the technical specification and the evaluation criteria, publishes the notice or invites bidders, receives the offers within the set deadline, evaluates them against the announced criteria and records the outcome in a selection report, followed by the contract.

Each step leaves mandatory traces: the request for quotation sent, proof of publication or the invitations, the offers received intact, the completed evaluation grid, the communications to bidders. That file is archived for the whole monitoring period of the project — audits can ask for it at any time.

Comparability of offers: where the procedure is won or lost

A good request for quotation lists the required functionality, the estimated volumes, the desired deadline and the expected price format — and serious bidders answer in that structure. When one of them nonetheless sends a global price with no breakdown, the beneficiary's internal evaluator is left with a choice impossible to justify on paper.

Our recommendation for beneficiaries: explicitly demand the breakdown by component, the staged deadlines and the warranty terms as mandatory elements of the offer. Offers that lack them can be declared non-compliant — and the procedure stays clean and easy to defend.

Frequently asked questions

I am a private company — do I really need a competitive procedure for the project software?

It depends on the estimated value. Order MFE no. 1284/2016, extended to the 2021-2027 cohesion funds by Order MFE no. 1354/2023, provides for direct purchase below the thresholds of art. 7(5) of Law 98/2016 and for the competitive procedure at or above them. Supporting documents are kept either way, and the concrete obligations sit in your financing contract.

How many quotes do I have to collect for a software purchase?

The minimum number is set by the procedure applicable to your call — programmes differ, and some also require a published notice rather than direct invitations only. The exact figure comes from the authority's instructions, not from the practice of other programmes.

What makes software offers comparable with one another?

The same structure: an answer against every requirement in the specification, a price broken down by component, staged deadlines and declared warranty terms. The request for quotation has to impose that format — otherwise you receive three documents impossible to put into one grid.

Can the supplier help write the specification without compromising the procedure?

With care: the specification must describe the beneficiary's needs, not one bidder's product, and requirements visibly cut to fit a supplier taint the selection. The healthy approach is for the specification to stay functional — what the system has to do — so that any supplier can answer it.