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The significance of the factors influencing bid/no-bid decisions varies significantly depending on the organization's size and geographical region. The present study examined the critical factors influencing the bid/no-bid decisions of small and medium-sized contractors in Sri Lanka. Primary data were collected from 160 small and 118 medium-sized contractors in Sri Lanka through a questionnaire survey. The respondents were requested to rate the relative importance of 43 factors, and consequently, critical factors were identified. In-depth interviews with six industry experts were conducted to obtain a deeper understanding of the critical factors. Small-sized contractors perceived project size, availability of capital, timeliness of client in the payments process, current workload, and general overhead as the five most critical factors in the bid reasoning process. In contrast, medium-sized contractors deemed project size, current workload, type of project, availability of qualified staff, and duration of project vital in their bid/no-bid decision reasoning process. This study's findings bridge the literature gap by prioritizing the factors most relevant to small and medium-sized contractors' bid/no-bid decisions in South Asia. The study further qualitatively assessed the critical factors and added insight into the governing mechanisms behind the critical factors, an area often neglected in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of Third-Party Logistics (TPL) is a common practice among manufacturing companies seeking to increase profitability. However, the tender process in selecting a TPL service provider can be challenging, requiring significant effort from both the tendering company and the service provider. The latter must meticulously plan processes and calculate pricing positions while running the risk of losing the bid. This risk impedes verifying logistical feasibility and comparing different logistic concepts extensively, such as layouts, which are often work-intensive. With the ongoing progress of research toward automatic simulation model generation for material flow, it is left to answer whether such approaches can improve the planning processes of TPL service providers by using planning data to generate simulation models. Therefore, this work presents a system with an underlying ontology to generate material flow simulations by developing a model transformation methodology. The system's functions are tested to determine whether they can support the planning process using defined case studies that cover everyday planning decisions. As a result, the system is capable of verifying the performance of planned logistic systems with minimal manual modelling efforts. This encompasses the evaluation of alternative logistical concepts for configuring the planned systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Pooled procurement is key to managing drug spending amid rising healthcare costs, but conclusive evidence on its sustained impact is lacking, driven by market competition. Objective: This study aims to evaluate the trends and factors influencing the price changes of drugs awarded for pooled procurement systems utilizing a drug price index analysis. Methods: This retrospective study involved a review of secondary data on public pooled procurement of drugs in Malaysia. Drugs were selected through purposive sampling and focused on eight therapeutic subgroups that showed significant patterns of expenditure and consumption. The observed data are retrieved from centralized contracts that were managed through a tendering process spanning from 2010 to 2021. A price index was computed to assess fluctuations in pharmaceutical pricing and market competition. To assess the influence of potential variables on market competition, quantified through the drug price index, a multiple linear regression analysis was utilized. The variables studied include product age, quantity index, bidding periods, therapeutic subgroups, and market competition elements such as types and number of competing products, dosage form, and types of procurements. The significance level was set at p

E-procurement, indicated as an emerging trend in procurement, promises various benefits including cost reduction, improved efficiency, and transparency. However, its uptake and effectiveness within the tendering processes of public institutions in Kenya have been limited. The purpose of the study was to analyze the adoption of electronic ordering and its effect on tendering process efficiency in public universities in Kenya. The study was grounded on the Technology Acceptance Model. The study applied a descriptive research design. The population of the study was 136 employees of thirty-four public universities in Kenya. Slovin's formula was used to determine a sample size of 102 respondents and purposive sampling was employed to select three respondents from each university targeting Heads of Procurement, Finance, and ICT departments because they are responsible for handling the University's day-to-day procurement tasks and ensuring compliance with procurement policies, will constitute the targeted population. They regularly engage with procurement systems and play a key role in managing electronic procurement matters for the University. To assess the reliability of the questionnaire, the researcher applied Cronbach's Alpha formula. Primary data was collected by a structured questionnaire employing a five-point Likert scale. Subsequently, the data was coded and analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) for descriptive and inferential statistical, and the findings were presented in tables. The results indicated that electronic ordering was found to be statistically significant in predicting tender process effectiveness, with a p-value of 0.000. The study recommends that to enhance the effectiveness of electronic ordering systems, institutions should allocate resources toward training and capacitybuilding initiatives for individuals involved in procurement activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the tender phase of public construction projects in Portugal, documents that describe the project are mandatorily submitted to open data repositories. However, in their current state, most of these repositories do not allow for benchmarking analysis due to a lack of data treatment and cohesion. This paper seeks to diagnose the main trends during the public construction project’s tender phase by performing a descriptive statistical analysis on the Portuguese Public Procurement Database (PPPData), a database that compiles 5172 public procurement contracts in Portugal from 2015 to 2022, to respond to the research gap in construction procurement benchmarking. The results of this statistical analysis draw out the main trends, uncover which tender variables can influence budget compliance, and diagnose Portugal’s public procurement in terms of its geographical, temporal, financial, and performance dispersion. This paper concludes that the award criteria are not correlated with final project performance and that multifactor assessment criteria do not necessarily lead to better performance. High-value projects awarded solely with the price award criterion tend to perform worse than those awarded with the multifactor assessment. The study also identified frequent errors and omissions in construction reporting; thus, there is a need for error mitigation tools.

The problem of slow productivity growth in the road construction (and wider construction) industry is well known. The present paper suggests a means for efficiency analysis in one part of this industry, namely road surface renewal in Sweden, built upon the application of Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) techniques. The paper is novel in that it focuses on project level rather than firm or contractor level performance and takes the perspective of the inefficiency that may result from the way the contracts are specified by the highway agency's pavement engineers (client side). We compare 233 renewal contracts tendered over a four-year period via the estimation of a cost frontier, with controls for heterogeneity between projects. Our results produce first estimates that expose substantive differences in the relative efficiency performance of different engineers within the Swedish highways procurement organisation (Trafikverket); with indicative savings of around €40 m out of a total road renewals budget in Sweden of €200 m. We also find substantial economies of scale that could, in principle, point to further cost savings if road renewal projects can be packaged up as larger projects. These client-side savings represent potentially important sources of savings in addition to those that can be achieved through the pressure of competitive tendering on the supplier side. The paper therefore illustrates how disaggregate analysis of project level information can readily be used for revealing important information about how best to frame the procurement process and thus deliver productivity and unit cost improvements over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the tender phase of public construction projects in Portugal, documents that describe the project are mandatorily submitted to open data repositories. However, in their current state, most of these repositories do not allow for benchmarking analysis due to a lack of data treatment and cohesion. This paper seeks to diagnose the main trends during the public construction project's tender phase by performing a descriptive statistical analysis on the Portuguese Public Procurement Database (PPPData), a database that compiles 5172 public procurement contracts in Portugal from 2015 to 2022, to respond to the research gap in construction procurement benchmarking. The results of this statistical analysis draw out the main trends, uncover which tender variables can influence budget compliance, and diagnose Portugal's public procurement in terms of its geographical, temporal, financial, and performance dispersion. This paper concludes that the award criteria are not correlated with final project performance and that multifactor assessment criteria do not necessarily lead to better performance. High-value projects awarded solely with the price award criterion tend to perform worse than those awarded with the multifactor assessment. The study also identified frequent errors and omissions in construction reporting; thus, there is a need for error mitigation tools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gates' (1967) bidding model was one of the earliest proposed for construction bidding. Its most celebrated formula allows for calculating the probability of any bidder submitting the lowest bid when competing against several known competitors. This model has been shown to outperform many recent bidding models. However, it also suffers from important limitations that keep it from being applied in wider contexts. In this paper, we overcome two of such limitations. First, we extend Gates' model to calculate the probability of a bidder ending in any position other than the first (lowest). Second, we propose an approach for extrapolating the probabilities of all bidders underbidding each other, even in those situations of limited access to historical bidding information. Overcoming these limitations significantly enhances Gates' model in two ways. First, it allows anticipating the probabilities of winning an auction in best value auctions where bidders who submitted a competitive but not necessarily the lowest bid can still win. Second, our extension allows applying Gates' formula in situations of incomplete information. This is especially interesting when some bidders have not met in previous auctions and there is no information from them individually underbidding each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the dynamics of engineer-to-order (ETO) practice through Integration Definition for Function Modelling (IDEF) practice. The paper describes and defines how an ETO manufacturer utilised IDEF-QA in order to manage project uncertainties within the tendering process. The research is conceptualised through an empirical action research approach, involving an active role in the assessment of the ETO process. The paper revisits the use of IDEF, showcasing an assessment of output quality. It also suggests a road map for resource uncertainty within ETO, specifically when scoping the supply chain for ETO projects. The paper then presents an IDEF Quality Assessment model for improving the tendering process of ETO, and it examines the importance of evaluating project behaviour for supporting new future projects. The principal contribution is in how a structured approach provides IDEF with a quality assessment of resources, thereby consolidating and establishing a relationship for highlighting the uncertainties experienced by ETO manufacturers within the decision-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pooled procurement is key to managing drug spending amid rising healthcare costs, but conclusive evidence on its sustained impact is lacking, driven by market competition. This study aims to evaluate the trends and factors influencing the price changes of drugs awarded for pooled procurement systems utilizing a drug price index analysis. This retrospective study involved a review of secondary data on public pooled procurement of drugs in Malaysia. Drugs were selected through purposive sampling and focused on eight therapeutic subgroups that showed significant patterns of expenditure and consumption. The observed data are retrieved from centralized contracts that were managed through a tendering process spanning from 2010 to 2021. A price index was computed to assess fluctuations in pharmaceutical pricing and market competition. To assess the influence of potential variables on market competition, quantified through the drug price index, a multiple linear regression analysis was utilized. The variables studied include product age, quantity index, bidding periods, therapeutic subgroups, and market competition elements such as types and number of competing products, dosage form, and types of procurements. The significance level was set at p < 0.05. The median price index, derived from the analysis of 88 drugs involved in 335 tenders over 10 years was 89.28 (range between 1.91 and 123.81). The observed trends indicated a consistent decline in the median drug price index throughout the bidding periods. The regression model, encompassing 19 selected variables, demonstrated the ability to predict the drug price index shown by the F-statistic (F (19, 315) = 68.022, p < 0.0005) with adj. R2 = 0.79. The coexistence of innovative or reference products and their generic or biosimilar equivalents in a market may promote competition. Five to eight competing products resulted in remarkably low drug prices. Pooled procurement is one of the approaches to cost containment that is potentially subject to the dynamics of market competition. Time can be a limiting factor that hinders the realization of greater savings. Therefore, it is important to strike a delicate balance when considering regulatory measures, such as patents and barriers to market entry, in order to maintain a fair and competitive landscape within the industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Food Science & Technology & Economy is the property of Grain Science & Technology & Economy Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The construction industry adds a high share to global CO2 emissions and, thus, to the global climate crisis. Future buildings need to be planned, constructed, operated, and deconstructed in a lifecycle-oriented manner so that the building stock represents a capital asset for future generations. The greatest leverages for reducing a building's CO2 emissions lie in the early project phase and subsequently in the tendering and awarding process, which makes early Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) indispensable. In this study, we set a sociological research framework consisting of (i) choosing a research topic, (ii) conducting a literature review, (iii) measuring variables and gathering data, (iv) analyzing data, and (v) drawing a conclusion. Since there are countless studies that apply LCA in the construction sector for environmental assessment, emission reduction, or decision support, we posed the question of whether LCA was also applied in the public building tendering and awarding process. Furthermore, we focused on identifying obstacles to LCA implementation in this early project phase. Therefore, we applied the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines and conducted a Systematic Literature Review (SLR). The results show that numerous articles focused on sustainable tendering or green public procurement in the construction industry; however, the LCA method is scarcely used in the procurement processes (19 articles in the final sample). Based on our findings, the main obstacles to LCA implementation in the procurement process are highlighted in the study. In the future, the mandatory integration of LCA into the procurement process will be crucial to reduce the CO2 emissions generated by the construction industry and thus contribute to the EU climate target plan to ensure carbon neutrality by 2050. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With more than 5,000 annual contracts and an estimated total budget of 738.3 million euros invested in institutional advertising, the public sector is the main advertiser in Spain. In its tenders, one of the aspects with the greatest impact on the award is the economic offer. The application of current regulations to ten tenders is analyzed, with special attention to abnormal low bids. The results show that the tenders favor aggressive economic offers. The best technical bid does not always win, and the impact of abnormally low bids as such is reduced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Administrative contracts are conducted to meet government agencies' requirements in terms of procurement, which is done by tendering. The government infrastructure demand and day-to-day other needs are contracted with vendors, who render their services by applying the announced tender. Hence, the legal framework related to tendering is very important, which protects the legal rights of tender authority and vendors. This present research aims to explore the tendering law in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, having a close legal framework regarding tendering. Egypt is carrying the tender law of 1998, which is updated in 2018 recently. Moreover, tendering in Saudi Arabia depends on the Government Tenders and Procurement Law (GTPL) of 2019, which is updated from the previous version of GTPL 2006. The research explores the basic structure of the procurement system and tendering in both systems, including the discussions on procurement agency, tendering methods, basic tendering regulations, public-private partnership, transparency issue, and tendering with foreigners' bidders. Also, the recent improvements in both tendering systems are discussed. The research traces many similarities and differences in both tendering systems and suggests taking help from each other's experiences.

Abstract Considering the uncertainties of the behaviour of electric vehicles (EVs) and the bidding of other participants in the market, the light robustness bidding model for the EV aggregator in the day‐ahead market is constructed. The model is a bilevel model, with the upper‐level model representing cost minimisation of the EV aggregator, whereas the lower‐level model represents market clearing providing market price and bidding energy for the upper‐level model. Bids of other market participants and EV driving pattern were not known to the EV aggregator in advance. They were seen as uncertain variables. A numerical example was used to illustrate the feasibility of the proposed method. Through the example analysis, the costs of the EV aggregator under different circumstances are compared and, under the same uncertainties, the results of the method proposed herein are also compared with the traditional robust optimisation method and stochastic fuzzy programming method.

Abstract The development of optimization methods for market clearing aims to improve the rationality of bidding and maximise social welfare. Existing electricity markets only allow a non‐decreasing bidding curve for generating companies (GenCos) owing to the convex limitation of the optimization model. However, the marginal cost of GenCos is sometimes non‐increasing, such as GenCos involved in deep peak regulation, which requires the non‐increasing bidding of GenCos. Focussing on the non‐increasing stepwise bidding curves of the GenCos, an improved optimization method is proposed that imposes augmented constraints on the bidding segments so that each bid segment can be allocated in order. In this way, the proper sequence of the bid quantity of each segment can be guaranteed. The numeral testing results verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Public construction projects in Saudi Arabia are fraught with several challenges threatening open and fair competition, which consequently negatively influence the decision of contractors to participate in bidding. Nevertheless, the construction sector has witnessed rapid reforms since 2016, which have resulted in the issuing of new legislation and regulations as well as the creation of governing bodies. Hence, the concept of open and fair competition plays a significant role in the governance of these challenges in the upstream process of construction tendering. Therefore, this paper explores challenges that are hindering contractors' participation in the tendering phase of public construction projects in light of these new legislations and authorities. Twelve challenging factors were identified from a structured literature review of previous relevant empirical studies available in online search engines since the 1980s. Those factors were measured through Delphi survey questionnaires, which provided respondents with the option of adding new challenging factors. Thus, twenty factors were identified. A descriptive method was used to determine and prioritize these challenging factors. The survey findings indicate that the most influential hindering factors are (1) awarding contracts based on the lowest bidder, (2) inadequate or incomplete specifications, (3) poor contract documents, and (4) poor cost-estimating practices. These findings are vital in exposing the lack of relationships between the construction industry, regulators, and stakeholders for robust partnerships, thereby helping to ensure the fair participation of contractors, which boosts open and fair competition concepts for public construction projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The selection of the procurement model, which is a process of discretion exercised by procurement officials, is crucial to the Public-private Partnership (PPP) procurement performance. From theoretical analysis and international practice, we could find that the negotiation method is more suitable for complex PPP projects, while the tendering method is widely used in China's PPP procurement. To analyze the reasons for the phenomenon, we used the logit regression model to examine the influence of regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interaction on the procurement model selection based on the data of 8,926 PPP projects from 2009 to 2021 in China. The results indicate that regulatory competition leads to confusion in procurement model selection, while risk aversion preference and tacit interaction significantly promote the application of tendering. Moreover, the heterogeneity analysis of regions and return models prove that provincial capitals and municipalities are more susceptible to regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interaction than ordinary cities. Compared with user-pay projects, government-pay projects and viability gap funding projects are more susceptible to regulatory competition and risk aversion preference, and less affected by tacit interaction. Therefore, to optimize the procurement model selection, policymakers should improve procurement policies to reduce the adverse effects of regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The selection of the procurement model, which is a process of discretion exercised by procurement officials, is crucial to the Public-private Partnership (PPP) procurement performance. From theoretical analysis and international practice, we could find that the negotiation method is more suitable for complex PPP projects, while the tendering method is widely used in China’s PPP procurement. To analyze the reasons for the phenomenon, we used the logit regression model to examine the influence of regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interaction on the procurement model selection based on the data of 8,926 PPP projects from 2009 to 2021 in China. The results indicate that regulatory competition leads to confusion in procurement model selection, while risk aversion preference and tacit interaction significantly promote the application of tendering. Moreover, the heterogeneity analysis of regions and return models prove that provincial capitals and municipalities are more susceptible to regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interaction than ordinary cities. Compared with user-pay projects, government-pay projects and viability gap funding projects are more susceptible to regulatory competition and risk aversion preference, and less affected by tacit interaction. Therefore, to optimize the procurement model selection, policymakers should improve procurement policies to reduce the adverse effects of regulatory competition, risk aversion preference, and tacit interactions.

Post Tender Negotiation (PTN) procedure is part of the tendering process in procurement of goods and services. The procedure could be triggered if the initial tendering activity does not result in the selection of a supplier. This could be due to a lack of clear Value for Money (VfM) bidder. The PTN procedure is sparingly applied in the UK public sector procurement and the reasons adduced for this are based on ethical considerations. The UK Office of Government Procurement (OGP), formerly known as the Office for Government Commerce (OGC) and the European Union (EU) are the chief proponents of restricting the use of PTN to exceptional cases. The premise of their argument is that the buyer could unethically tilt her/his actions in the process of applying the PTN procedure to favor certain suppliers. It is the argument of this paper that buyers from the public sector in UK are being deprived of the procedure’s benefit and therefore, the restrictions should be relaxed. Evidence from this study suggests that the procedure could offer the opportunity for further clarifications of supplier’s bid. The study also identifies that, for PTN to be successful, factors ensuring success in negotiations including cooperation should be present.

Copyright of Themis: Revista de Derecho is the property of Themis Asociacion and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In standard auction theory, the 'revenue equivalence theorem' asserts that the outcomes of the elementary allocation methods coincide. However, bidding processes differ fundamentally with regard to the decision situation of the participants: Is it at all imperative to take into consideration the number of competitors ('stochastic' strategy) or not ('deterministic' course of action)? Furthermore, established auction theory neglects the operating modes of procurement alternatives under uncertainty. Apart from the lacking knowledge how many rivals have to be beaten, tenderers regularly are ignorant of the buyer's reserve price. Then it is even more tentative to calculate an offer based on probability theory. Consequently, the suppliers' propensity to collude increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since up to 60 percent of health care expenditures in developing countries are allocated to pharmaceutical products, utilizing this budget in order to supply pharmaceutical products is important. Good Procurement Practice (GPP) with the assistance of various ways of tendering is one of the most cost-effective methods in this matter. Studies showed that adding one extra supplier to tendering will cause 10 percent price reduction on average which is considered the most important outcome of tendering. In cases where there are many suppliers, tendering is recommended as a strong method in pricing and reimbursement. It seemed that GPP in reimbursement companies is not sufficient in Iran. Although bidding in countries that have developed in the generic markets is more common than those that are reaching this goal, it is recommended that reimbursement companies use bidding for inpatients, outpatients, specific patients and product groups, vaccines, and bulk products in cumulative and regional and national level. These would result in optimum use of the public budget.

Public construction projects in Saudi Arabia are fraught with several challenges threatening open and fair competition, which consequently negatively influence the decision of contractors to participate in bidding. Nevertheless, the construction sector has witnessed rapid reforms since 2016, which have resulted in the issuing of new legislation and regulations as well as the creation of governing bodies. Hence, the concept of open and fair competition plays a significant role in the governance of these challenges in the upstream process of construction tendering. Therefore, this paper explores challenges that are hindering contractors’ participation in the tendering phase of public construction projects in light of these new legislations and authorities. Twelve challenging factors were identified from a structured literature review of previous relevant empirical studies available in online search engines since the 1980s. Those factors were measured through Delphi survey questionnaires, which provided respondents with the option of adding new challenging factors. Thus, twenty factors were identified. A descriptive method was used to determine and prioritize these challenging factors. The survey findings indicate that the most influential hindering factors are (1) awarding contracts based on the lowest bidder, (2) inadequate or incomplete specifications, (3) poor contract documents, and (4) poor cost-estimating practices. These findings are vital in exposing the lack of relationships between the construction industry, regulators, and stakeholders for robust partnerships, thereby helping to ensure the fair participation of contractors, which boosts open and fair competition concepts for public construction projects.

The study aims at evaluating the project management process and how it influences successful construction project procurement in Nigeria. To achieve five research objectives were set up centering on ascertaining the effect of effective estimation and tendering process on construction project delivery in Nigeria, identifying the estimation and tendering processes that integrates with the construction project delivery, determining the project management factors that affects the Construction Project estimation and tendering in Nigeria, and identifying the hindrances to the application of estimation and tendering process for successful construction project delivery. Also two hypotheses were formulated. The study is a descriptive study survey with population delimited to the workforce of construction contracting firms, namely Arab Contractors Imo State, Marcon Engineering Ltd Imo State and Gosh Projects Imo State; and construction consulting firms- Network Projects Imo State, Keliyke Imo State all in South Eastern part of Nigeria. A sample size of 200 was randomly selected, which was divided among the among the selected firms of study, and which cut across construction professionals such as Architects, Quantity Surveyors, Building Technologists, Civil/Structural Engineers, Electrical Engineers, Mechanical Engineers, Project Managers etc.. The research being a descriptive study involved the use of structured questionnaires delivered to the various respondents. Analytical tool used for the analysis was simple percentage for the category of demography of respondents, descriptive statistics for the evaluation of effects and linear regression analysis comprising F-test and ANOVA for the investigation of factors. In other to ensure error free computation, a statistical software package SPSS was employed. The study concludes that there is significant relationship between estimation and tendering process and construction project delivery; also the quality of estimation and tendering skills by procurement professionals influence the quality of project delivery in construction industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The public construction industry is a complex industry that mandates many restrictions, consists of different prolonged phases, and involves various approvals, a great number of authorities, and party associations. The tender stage is crucial in any construction project; it sets the basis of the second party selection to a contract, which is essential for the success of the project. The State of Kuwait issued The New Tender Law (No. 49 of 2016) aligning with the rapid development of laws and regulations. The New Tender Law has introduced twenty modifications, which were included in a survey distributed to a number of participants with experience in the public construction industry in Kuwait. Ninety-three completed surveys were gathered and included in the research’s analysis. Box plot and weighted average, along with the standard deviation, were used to sort the twenty tender law modifications according to their influence on bid price and overall project duration. Encouragement of foreign investment, changing contractor classifications, lengthy award processes, and prequalification and the possibility of rebidding are common tender law modifications that have significant impacts on both attributes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista de Estudios de la Administración Local y Autonómica is the property of Instituto Nacional de Administracion Publica and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Market power is an anti‐competitive issue in the electricity markets, the identification and monitoring of which require using comprehensive and accurate indices. In this study, two new behavioural indices are introduced for the effective and accurate monitoring of market power. The suggested indices determine the actual level of market power in the transmission‐constrained electricity markets by analysing the bidding behaviour of participants. The proposed indices necessarily consider the success of the participant's anti‐competitive behaviour in a price increase on the basis for computation. First, the effective physical withholding index is presented, which can determine the amount of physical withholding that has led to the acceptance of a more expensive block. The effective financial distortion rate index is then proposed, which can specify the degree of financial deviation of the participants resulting from the successful exercise of each participant's withholding (financial–physical) strategy. Investigation of the results obtained from a three‐bus test system and the IEEE 57‐bus test system verifies the effective and accurate performance of the proposed indices in assessing the market power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Access to biologic medicines (including biosimilars) across Europe is largely governed by a process of tendering conducted by health authorities. Over-reliance on treatment costs in awarding tenders has the potential to hinder competition and undermine the long-term sustainability of biosimilars. Objective: To assess the extent and impact of consideration of 'value-added services' (VAS) in tendering for biosimilars, we conducted a narrative review of published literature. Results: Findings from survey-based publications indicated that tendering practices for biosimilars are widely used, with cost being the main determinant of success and little detail being available on other criteria where these apply. Criteria (of therapeutic and technical interest) beyond price were included in one tendering specification for infliximab (originator and biosimilars), while a separate tender for the same product included VAS in the form of therapeutic drug monitoring, measurement of antibodies and calprotectin. Conclusions: Published evidence concerning inclusion of VAS in tendering for biosimilars is lacking. Development and implementation of standardized criteria and methods of assessment for tenders may avoid manufacturers facing segmented markets, encourage competition and the longer-term sustainability of biosimilars, and realize the healthcare system and patient benefits these treatments can bring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, power system operators have initiated procurement of a new service in electricity markets named flexible ramping product (FRP). With the main goal of enhancing the grid flexibility, this product can provide a remarkable opportunity for an enhanced short-term profitability. Energy storage systems (ESSs) with high ramping capability can leverage their profitability when properly participating in this market. This study introduces a stochastic optimisation framework for participation of ESSs in the FRP market. The proposed model formulates the optimal bidding strategy of ESSs considering the real-time energy, flexible ramp-up and ramp-down marginal price signals and the associated uncertainties. In addition, as the market participants cannot directly submit bids for the FRP, the corresponding energy bidding adjustments required to award the proper FRP amounts are elaborated. The mathematical model is linearised and its application in real-time market is investigated. The proposed framework is numerically analysed through which its effectiveness on enhancing the ESS profitability in the real-time electricity markets is verified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]