20000000 · UK public procurement notice

CPV: Technical support services

Procedure method

Negotiated without publication of a contract notice

Legal basis

CELEX · 32009L0081 Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011 (Directive 2009/81/EC)

Procurement category

Services

Notice status

Awarded

Procurement threshold

Unspecified in notice

Regulatory regime

Standard

Commercial structure

Stand-alone contract (no framework)

Competition type

Competitive procedure

GPA / WTO covered

Unspecified in notice

Recurring procurement

Unspecified in notice

First published

11 Mar 2021, 22:56 GMT

Last source update

9 Aug 2021, 22:45 BST

FTS notice number

2021/S 000-019254

Classification (CPV)

Technical support services

Delivery area

South West (UKK41)

Official registry OCID

ocds-h6vhtk-029afc Find a Tender

Why no open competition

The products involved are manufactured purely for the purpose of research, experiment, study or development under the conditions stated in the directive; The works, supplies or services can be provided only by a particular economic operator due to absence of competition for technical reasons

Published justification

The Platform Equipment Delivery Team (PEDT), part of the UK Ministry of Defence (the “Authority”), intends to enter into a contract (the “Contract”) with L3 MAPPS Ltd (the “Contractor”) to take effect on and from 1st December 2021 for a period of 3 years for the provision of in-service support of the Internal Communication Systems (ICS) and Astute Class Platform Complex Systems Batch 1 Platform Management System (PMS) and equipment, providing technical support, waterfront support and Post Design Services ensuring that availability is maintained and obsolescence and reliability issues are addressed, including the provision of ICS Spares and Repairs. The systems provide critical safety and operational functions in support of the Authority’s Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA) capabilities. The Contract has a value (ex VAT) of approx. £20,000,000 (Twenty million pounds sterling).

It is considered that the Contract can be entered into using the negotiated procedure without prior publication of a contract notice pursuant to Article 28(1)(e) of Directive 2009/81/EC and Regulation 16(1)(a)(ii) of the Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011 on the basis that the Contract may be awarded only to the Contractor for technical reasons.

The Contractor is the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) and Design Authority (DA) for, and holder of all relevant proprietary information in the ICS and A-Class Platform Complex Systems Batch 1 PMS. The Contractor holds and maintains deployed software source codes and original technical documentation specific to the Astute Class Boats 1 to 7 ICS and any changes or modifications to the software can only be undertaken exclusively by the Contractor. As the OEM and DA, only the Contractor has the ability to make amendments to the Batch 1 PMS as in order to make amendments to the Batch 1 PMS, access to the Contractor’s proprietary toolset, MAPPS, is required. This is necessary for the performance of the requirement.

The Authority does not have sufficient knowledge or experience of using the MAPPS toolset and the Authority does not have any proprietary rights in the MAPPS proprietary toolset used for actual coding and is therefore unable to pass this on to any third party. The Contractor, as the only manufacturer and supplier of the ICS and A-Class Platform Complex systems Batch 1 PMS, is the only economic operator with the specific technical knowledge and experience of the ICS and A-Class PMS system to be able to support and update such equipment, avoiding safety and availability risk issues. PMS and ICS provide critical safety and operational functions to the ASTUTE Class. PMS is integral to delivering key platform capability, with several safety critical systems, namely Nuclear Steam Raising Plant (NSRP), steering, diving and platform systems, having a direct dependency on the continued operation of PMS. ICS also provides a significant Platform Safety role by providing all Primary, Secondary and Damage Control Communications. The loss of either system will have a direct impact on Platform safety. The associated software is also at Safety Integrity Level (SIL2) due to the role it provides on-board and only the Contractor (as OEM and DA) has the requisite tools, knowledge and experience to immediately respond to a software issue, and deliver an updated product that achieves all of the safety requirements without impacting Platform availability.

• L3 MAPPS LtdAwarded supplier Bristol, South West

No document links were published on the notice.