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
- Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew · Ministry or any other national or federal authority, including their regional or local subdivisions
- Supplier
- Vision Engineering Ltd SME
- Value
- £83,000
- Procedure
- Single tender action (below threshold)
- Sector
- Laboratory & precision equipment · Microscopes (CPV 38510000)
- Region
- London
- Official notice
- View on Contracts Finder
- Timeline
-
- Contract date5 Feb 2025
- Published1 Apr 2025Published 55 days after the contract date
Description
Trust Millennium Seed Bank is home to one of the largest ex situ repositories of wild seeds in the world, with collections of more than 40,000 species from across the globe. Kew requires replacement ergonomic stereoscopes to support the routine maintenance and research of these collections, including tasks such as germination scoring, seed counting, and morphological studies, which often require extended periods of stereoscope use. These stereoscopes are critical to both research and education. We require stereoscopes with a variable zoom range between 4x and 60x, providing sufficient working distance to allow the use of dissection tools on samples without obstruction. The stereoscopes should feature powerful LED illumination from above to ensure clear visibility of samples. They must be comfortable for users wearing glasses and designed for ease of operation to minimize discomfort during extended periods of use. Additionally, the stereoscopes should allow samples to be observable eve…
About the supplier
Vision Engineering Ltd: every public contract they have won, plus their Companies House record (company 00599506).