Awarded without open competition
Awarded without open competition. The buyer went directly to one or a few suppliers instead of advertising the contract. Procurement rules allow this only in specific cases, such as extreme urgency, when only one supplier can do the work, or for call-offs from an existing framework.
Key facts
- Buyer
- DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS (Defra Network eTendering Portal) · National or federal agency/office
- Supplier
- Cranfield University SME
- Value
- £6,500,000
- Procedure
- Negotiated without publication of a contract notice
- Sector
- IT services · Data services (CPV 72300000)
- Region
- London
- Official notice
- 005783-2025 on Find a Tender
- Timeline
-
- Contract date19 Feb 2025
- Published19 Feb 2025Published the same day
Description
The existing LandIS agreement between Cranfield University (CU) and Defra sets out that Cranfield charges for access to its datasets and limits how they can be used, which broadly encompasses:<br/><br/>• The platform which is owned and hosted by Cranfield for the provision of National Soil Map (NATMAP)<br/>• National Soil Inventory (NSI) and soil attribute data (SOILSERIES & HORIZON), and its supplementary data bases (broadly: the LandIS platform data).<br/><br/>All Crown bodies currently enjoy full royalty-free access to LandIS, and this available to charities and research institutions. However, non-crown bodies such as the Environment Agency or Natural England, and other public sector bodies, private individuals, consultants, and businesses do not have royalty-free access to this data, which significantly hampers the use of soil data more widely. Most significantly, the current licencing limits how Defra can use these data sets to further its policy objectives.<br/><br/>The decision…
About the supplier
Cranfield University: every public contract they have won, plus their Companies House record (company RC000151).