What Is an Open Tender?

In an open tender, the contracting authority publishes a contract notice on an official e-procurement portal inviting all interested economic operators to submit tenders. There is no pre-qualification or shortlisting stage—any company that meets the stated requirements can prepare and submit a tender response.

The open procedure is codified in EU Directive 2014/24/EU (Article 27) for public-sector contracts and Directive 2014/25/EU for utilities. Under these rules the contracting authority must allow a minimum of 35 days from the date the contract notice is dispatched to TED for suppliers to submit their bids. This period can be shortened to 15 days when a prior information notice (notice of intent) was published or when electronic submission is accepted.

Open tenders are the go-to procedure because they uphold core principles of EU public procurement: equal treatment, non-discrimination, transparency, proportionality, and mutual recognition. Any restriction on who may bid must be justified by specific legal grounds.

Understanding the differences between procurement procedures helps suppliers decide which opportunities to pursue. In a restricted procedure (Article 28 of Directive 2014/24/EU), the authority first publishes a notice and selects a shortlist of candidates through a pre-qualification questionnaire before inviting those candidates to bid. This two-stage process reduces the evaluation burden for complex contracts but limits competition to shortlisted firms.

A negotiated procedure without prior publication is permitted only under exceptional circumstances—for example, extreme urgency, a single viable supplier, or when open or restricted procedures have failed to attract suitable bids. The competitive procedure with negotiation (Article 29) allows the authority to negotiate terms with bidders, often used for contracts requiring innovation or bespoke solutions.

The competitive dialogue procedure (Article 30) goes even further, giving authorities the ability to discuss solutions with candidates before defining the final specification. This is common for large infrastructure or IT projects where the authority cannot fully specify requirements in advance.

Open tenders skip all pre-qualification and negotiation steps, making them faster to launch, simpler to administer, and more accessible for small and medium-sized enterprises. However, they can generate a high volume of submissions, which increases the authority’s evaluation workload. For well-defined goods and services where the specification is clear, open tenders remain the most efficient route. For a step-by-step walkthrough, see our guide on how to respond to a tender.

The legal basis for open tenders in Europe comes from two key directives transposed into national law across all EU and EEA member states:

• Directive 2014/24/EU — governs public works, supply, and service contracts above specified thresholds.
• Directive 2014/25/EU — covers procurement by entities operating in the water, energy, transport, and postal sectors (utilities).

In the UK, the Procurement Act 2023 replaced the previous EU-derived regulations following Brexit. While the terminology has shifted, the open procedure remains the default procurement route and functions in substantially the same way.

The EU’s public procurement policy requires that all contracts above threshold values be advertised on TED (Tenders Electronic Daily). Below-threshold contracts may still use open procedures at the authority’s discretion, though shorter timelines and simplified rules may apply. Each member state also maintains a national e-procurement platform—for instance, BOAMP in France, DTVP in Germany, and TenderNed in the Netherlands—where open tenders are published alongside TED.

Classifying the subject matter of an open tender correctly requires the use of CPV codes (Common Procurement Vocabulary), a standardised taxonomy that helps authorities describe what they are buying and helps suppliers find relevant opportunities.

EU procurement directives mandate the use of formal procedures, including open tenders, for contracts whose estimated value exceeds specific EU thresholds. These thresholds are revised every two years by the European Commission and are based on Special Drawing Rights (SDR) values set by the WTO Government Procurement Agreement (GPA).

For 2024–2025, the key thresholds for central government authorities are approximately €143,000 for supply and service contracts and €5,538,000 for works contracts. Sub-central authorities (regional and local) have a higher supply/service threshold of approximately €221,000.

Below these thresholds, authorities still have discretion to use open procedures, and many do so to ensure transparency and value for money. In the UK, the Procurement Act 2023 has consolidated thresholds and simplified rules, but the open procedure remains available for contracts of any value.

In the United States, federal procurement above the Simplified Acquisition Threshold (currently $250,000) is generally published on SAM.gov. While the US does not use the term “open tender,” full-and-open competition is the equivalent principle, ensuring any qualified vendor can bid on opportunities that are not subject to set-aside restrictions.

An open tender follows a structured lifecycle that is consistent across jurisdictions:

1. Planning and market engagement — The authority defines requirements, estimates the contract value, and may issue a notice of intent (prior information notice) to alert the market.

2. Publication — The contract notice is published on TED (for above-threshold EU contracts), the relevant national portal, and sometimes on the authority’s own website. The notice specifies the subject, CPV codes, estimated value, submission deadline, and award criteria.

3. Supplier questions — Interested suppliers may submit clarification questions. The authority must respond in writing, and both questions and answers are typically shared with all potential bidders to maintain a level playing field.

4. Tender submission — Suppliers prepare and submit their bids electronically through the designated e-procurement platform before the deadline. Late submissions are rejected.

5. Evaluation — A panel reviews submissions against published criteria, which may be lowest price or most economically advantageous tender (MEAT). The evaluation is scored and documented.

6. Award and standstill — The authority issues an award decision and notifies all bidders. In the EU, a mandatory standstill period of at least 10 days allows unsuccessful bidders to challenge the decision before the contract is signed.

7. Contract execution — After the standstill period expires without challenge, the contract is signed and published as a contract award notice on TED.

This entire process can take 3–6 months from publication to contract signature, depending on the complexity of the requirement and the volume of bids received.

Because open tenders account for the majority of published procurement notices, they represent the largest pool of opportunities for businesses seeking government contracts. However, manually searching multiple portals—TED, SAM.gov, Contracts Finder, BOAMP, and dozens of others—is time-consuming and risks missing deadlines. See our comparison of manual vs automated monitoring to understand the efficiency gains.

Jorpex aggregates 50+ public procurement sources into a single platform. You can configure notification profiles with specific keywords (“open procedure,” “open tender”), regions, CPV or NAICS codes, contract value ranges, and disqualifying terms. AI matching scores each opportunity against your profile and delivers alerts via Slack, email, or Microsoft Teams—in real time, daily, or weekly digests.

For businesses working across borders, Jorpex supports multilingual tender alerts, ensuring you do not miss opportunities published in languages other than English. You can also filter by framework agreement status or target specific sources like TED or Contracts Finder.

To explore how Jorpex can help your business win more open tenders, compare your current approach with automated monitoring and see the difference in coverage and response time.