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Published 4 Jul 2025, 08:56 BST

Official UK procurement notice

CORE Development Services · UK public procurement notice

Official notice

Authority: OPEN UNIVERSITY(THE) (Education)

Direct award
Sectors: IT Services & Software (72) Delivery: South East (UKJ1)
Awarded value£450,000published award · exc. VAT
Award in standstill 7 Jul 2025no call for competition
Award (standstill) to Qubit Labs OÜ

What is being bought

Published requirement description

Service development capacity, in the form of software development and associated activities, to support the CORE project:

CORE hosts the world's largest collection of open access research outputs, which are used and referenced by people globally, including researchers, libraries, software developers,

funders

The lotProcurement structure

single lot · no lot value published
Lot #1Awarded
Delivery: South East
72230000 Custom software development services

Procedure terms & legal framework

From the official record
Procedure method
Direct award
Legal basis
UKPGA · 2023/54 Procurement Act 2023
Notice status
Awarded without competition
Procurement threshold
Unspecified in notice
Regulatory regime
Standard
Commercial structure
Stand-alone contract (no framework)
Competition type
Direct award (no call for competition)
GPA / WTO covered
Unspecified in notice
Recurring procurement
Unspecified in notice
First published
4 Jul 2025, 08:56 BST
Last source update
7 Jul 2025, 16:02 BST
Authority reference
OUPA10627
FTS notice number
2025/S 000-037972
Latest notice
Contract award notice (UK6)
Delivery area
South East (UKJ1)
Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-0558b7 Find a Tender
Why no open competition
Single Suppliers Technical Reasons
Published justification

The Open University (OU) intends to award a one (1) year agreement to Qubit Labs to provide software development and associated activities, to support the CORE OU project.

The CORE code base contains more than 250k lines of code Qubit personnel have the required training, expertise and specialist knowledge to operate and develop the CORE infrastructure. The cost and time to upskill another company to the level required precludes the award of the contract to a company other than Qubit.

How it was run

Official notice
Submission deadline
—

Timeline

7 Jul 2025 → 17 Jul 2025 · 2 dates
  1. Notice published
    7 Jul 2025, 16:02 BST
  2. Standstill ends
    17 Jul 2025, 23:59 BST

Notice history

3 events · 2 releases on Find a Tender · since 4 Jul 2025
  1. Transparency notice published
    4 Jul 2025, 08:56 BST
    UK5
  2. Contract award notice published
    7 Jul 2025, 16:02 BST
    UK6
  3. Contract signature expected
    7 Aug 2025, 23:59 BST
    scheduled

Commercial outcome & contract awards

Published awards, contracts and bid statistics, not a forecast
Awards 1
Awarded value £450,0001 award exc. VAT
Awarded toValueDateStatus
Qubit Labs OÜ8 Aug 2025 – 31 Jul 2026£450,0007 Jul 2025standstill to 17 Jul 2025Standstill

Contracting authority & participating public bodies

THE OPEN UNIVERSITY

Contracting authorityPublic authority - sub-central government GB-CHC: RC000391 · GB-PPON: PYNW-6296-ZJQQ Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, South East, MK7 6AAContact email

Bidders & participating suppliers

1 commercial party on the notice
  • Qubit Labs OÜAwarded supplierGB-PPON: PJDT-6796-PBTZ Sepapaja, 6, Tallinn, EE, 15551, EEContact email

Official documents & specifications (2)

Official links; attachments are not copied

Notices published for this procedure

  • Contract award notice awardContract award noticeUK6Contract award notice on Find a Tender
  • Transparency notice awardTransparency noticeUK5Transparency notice on Find a Tender