Tender notice and invitation to tender: customer relationship intelligence platform
Documentfinal Kielderside Growth Agency · notice · final · 12 May 2026
Final tender notice issued on 12 May 2026 by the Agency's procurement team for a customer relationship intelligence platform. Twelve-month initial term with two optional one-year extensions. Bids scored seventy per cent quality, thirty per cent price. No service levels or prices are stated.
What it says
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Final tender notice issued on 12 May 2026 by the Agency's procurement team for a customer relationship intelligence platform. Twelve-month initial term with two optional one-year extensions. Bids scored seventy per cent quality, thirty per cent price. No service levels or prices are stated.
What it is: a public invitation to tender from the Agency, filed under its correspondence folder. It asks for a platform giving account managers, the enquiries line and the grants team one view of each business, queried in plain language and run "within the Agency's own cloud data environment".
Commits: the Agency does not commit to award. "Issuing this notice does not commit the Agency to award a contract." Bids must price the initial term and each extension in pounds sterling, separating one-off from recurring costs.
Unusual: the Agency may extend "at its sole discretion", and price is judged on the total across the initial term and both extensions. Contact outside the portal "may lead to a bid being disqualified", and the notice says a bid is "an offer that the Agency may accept".
Not settled: the clarification and bid deadlines are given only as the first Tuesday in June and the fourth Tuesday in June, so exact dates are not stated. The notice does not show whether BG-Demo is a bidder, nor any budget, availability or response-time terms. Tom Ashdown is the BG-Demo author on record.
As found in this document
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Initial contract termThe initial contract term is twelve months.Source: the AI read of this record
- ExtensionsThe Agency may, at its sole discretion, extend the contract twice, for one further year each time.Source: the AI read of this record
- Bid deadline12:00 on the fourth Tuesday in JuneSource: the AI read of this record
- Pricing currencyPrices must be in pounds sterling.Source: the AI read of this record
- Evaluation weightingQuality seventy per cent, Price thirty per centSource: the AI read of this record
The document
Body
Tender notice and invitation to tender: customer relationship intelligence platform
Issued by: Kielderside Growth Agency, Procurement Date of notice: Tuesday 12 May 2026 Status: Final, version one Procurement contact: Sarah Dodds, Category Manager, Procurement
Section A: Notice
Kielderside Growth Agency ("the Agency") invites bids for a customer relationship intelligence platform. The Agency is a business-support and inward-investment body owned by six North East councils. It account-manages a large number of growing businesses and runs grant programmes on behalf of its owners.
This notice and invitation to tender is published today. It sets out the contract on offer, the timetable, how bids will be evaluated and the rules every bidder must follow. All bidders receive the same information at the same time.
Section B: Background and need
At present, the Agency's account managers, its enquiries line and its grants team each hold part of the picture of a business. Information is spread across several systems and has to be reconciled by hand. The Agency wishes to give each of these teams a single view of every business it works with.
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The Agency is looking for a platform that:
- brings together records, correspondence, calls, enquiries and grant activity for each business in one place;
- can be queried in plain language by staff who are not data specialists;
- can be run within the Agency's own cloud data environment, so that data stays under the Agency's control;
- supports account managers, the enquiries line and the grants team as separate groups of users with appropriate access;
- can be supported and improved over the life of the contract.
Bidders should explain how their proposal meets each of these points and should say plainly where it does not.
Section C: The contract
- The initial contract term is twelve months.
- The Agency may, at its sole discretion, extend the contract twice, for one further year each time.
- Pricing must be stated for the initial term and for each optional extension.
- Bidders must state clearly what is one-off (for example implementation) and what is recurring.
- Prices must be in pounds sterling.
The Agency is under no obligation to exercise either extension, and a bid must not assume that it will.
Section D: Timetable
| Stage | Date and time |
|---|---|
| Tender notice published | Tuesday 12 May 2026 |
| Deadline for clarification questions | The first Tuesday in June |
| Deadline for submission of bids | 12:00 on the fourth Tuesday in June |
| Evaluation | After the bid deadline, by the Agency's evaluation panel |
The deadline for bids is noon. Bids received after 12:00 on the closing day will not be opened or evaluated, and the deadline will not be extended for any single bidder.
Section E: Clarification questions
- All questions must be submitted in writing through the portal. Questions sent by email, by telephone or through any other route will not be answered.
- Questions must be received by the clarification deadline shown in Section D.
- Every question and every answer will be recorded in the clarification log.
- Answers will be shared with all bidders, so please do not include confidential commercial information in a question. If a question cannot be asked without revealing such information, say so and the Agency will advise how it can be handled.
- The Agency will not take any question off the record.
Bidders must not contact members of the evaluation panel, Agency staff or the owning councils about this tender other than through the portal. Contact outside the process may lead to a bid being disqualified.
Section F: How to submit a bid
Bids must be submitted through the portal before the deadline in Section D. Please allow enough time to upload your documents: a bid that is still being uploaded at 12:00 will be treated as late.
A complete bid contains:
- a quality response, answering each of the points in Section B and describing implementation, support, data security and how the Agency's three teams would use the platform;
- a price response, set out as required in Section C;
- a statement of any assumptions, dependencies or exceptions;
- confirmation that the bidder accepts the terms of the invitation.
Bids must be written in English. The Agency may ask a bidder to clarify its bid after submission, but a bidder may not change the substance of its offer once the deadline has passed.
Section G: Evaluation
Bids will be scored against two headings:
| Heading | Weighting |
|---|---|
| Quality | seventy per cent |
| Price | thirty per cent |
Quality will be assessed by the Agency's evaluation panel against the needs in Section B, including how well the proposal serves each of the three user groups, how it is implemented and supported, and how it handles the Agency's data. Price will be assessed on the total cost across the initial term and both optional extensions.
Each bidder will be assessed against the same criteria and in the same way. The Agency will not comment on any bid to another bidder. Bidders will be told the outcome in writing, with feedback on request once the process is complete.
Section H: General conditions
- Issuing this notice does not commit the Agency to award a contract.
- Bidders bear their own costs of preparing and submitting a bid.
- The Agency may amend this notice before the bid deadline. Any amendment will be published through the portal to all bidders at the same time.
- Information provided by bidders will be treated as confidential, subject to the Agency's legal duties as a public body.
- A bid is an offer that the Agency may accept, and bidders should expect their bid to be open for acceptance while evaluation is under way.
Section I: Contact
All procedural matters are handled by the Agency's procurement team. Please submit that through the portal rather than writing to individuals.
Kind regards,
Sarah Dodds Category Manager, Procurement Kielderside Growth Agency
Unusual terms
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Extensions at Agency's sole discretion
- Price scored on initial term plus both extensions
- Contact outside portal may disqualify
- Bid open for acceptance during evaluation