Competitive Procedure with Negotiation Regarding Delivery and Implementation of a Learning Management System at Aarhus University

Kort beskrivelse

Aarhus University has an ambitious goal to create better degree programmes by making better use of possibilities for increased learning outcome, which the newest learning technologies pave the way for. In this context, the purchase of a visionary and future-oriented learning management system plays a decisive role as the technological framework for teaching activities.
A solution must include a learning management system fulfilling both the functional and non-functional requirements set out in the material. Furthermore, the solution must include an implementation plan fulfilling both requirements to migration and implementation of the solution such as this is described in the material. The organizational implementation is not included in the solution. Furthermore, the solution must include operation,support and maintenance in the contract period.

Beskrivelse af udbuddet

During the competitive procedure in the negotiation phase, initial tenders are submitted by tenderers. The Contracting Authority reserves the right to award the contract based on an initial tender.
If the Contracting Authority does not award the contract based on an initial tender, the selected tenderers who have submitted initial tenders will be invited to negotiate.the Contracting Authority will decide, whether negotiations will be conducted via a written or an oral procedure. As a general rule, one negotiation round is held, after which the Contracting Authority requests a final tender.The Contracting Authority reserves the right to hold two (2) rounds.
It is also a possibility to, after the first individual negotiation meeting with all tenderers, conduct further negotiations to eliminate tenderers — a shortlisting procedure.
Remuneration for participation in the negotiations will not be paid. Each Tenderer's tendered solution will be negotiated to provide a solution that best meets the Contracting Authority’s needs and wishes.
The contract will not be divided into lots, as the Contracting Authority requires one total solution.
Tender variants are not allowed.

Objektive kriterier for udvælgelse af det begrænsede antal ansøgere

Grounds for exclusion:
The Contracting Authority must exclude Candidates from participation in the tender procedure if the Candidate is covered by any of the compulsory grounds for exclusion set out in Sections 135-136 of the Danish Public Procurement Act, or by the voluntary ground for exclusion, cf. Section 137 No. 2 of the Public Procurement Act.:
2) The Candidate or tenderer has been declared bankrupt or is undergoing insolvency or winding-up proceedings, where the assets of the Candidate or tenderer is being administered by a receiver or by court if the Candidate or tenderer has entered an arrangement with creditors, where the commercial activities of the Candidate or tenderer has been discontinued, or where the Candidate or tenderer is in a similar situation under a similar procedure under national law in the jurisdiction in which the Candidate or tenderer is registered,
The Candidate must state this in part III of the ESPD.
The Contracting Authority may not exclude a Candidate covered by one or more of the grounds for exclusion set out in sections 135-137 of the Danish Public Procurement Act if the Candidate has provided sufficient documentation that the Candidate is reliable, even if the Candidate is covered by one or more of the grounds for exclusion, see section 138 of the Danish Public Procurement Act.
The Contracting Authority may only exclude a Candidate when it has informed the Candidate that it is subject to exclusion, and the Candidate has not provided sufficient documentation of its reliability within a suitable time limit fixed by the Contracting Authority (this mechanism is called self-cleaning).
What constitutes sufficient documentation is listed in section 138(3) of the Act.
The Contracting Authority will initiate a self-cleaning procedure when the Candidate is covered by the grounds for exclusion set out in sections 135-137 of the Danish Public Procurement Act.
Documentation:
The Contracting Authority request that each Candidate submits documentation for the information provided in the ESPD along with submission of request for participation.
The following must be provided along the ESPD as documentation that the tenderer is not covered by the grounds for exclusion set out in section 135, (1-3) and section 137 (2) of the Danish Public Procurement Act:
— a certificate issued in accordance with section 153 (1) of the Danish Public Procurement Act.
Danish Tenderers may produce a “service attest” (official certificate) issued by the Danish Business Authority.
If such certificates or documents are not issued in the tenderer’s country, they may be replaced by a declaration on oath or solemn declaration in accordance with section 153(2) of the Danish Public Procurement Act.
The certificate is also regarded as documentation that the Candidate has fulfilled all its obligations towards the public authorities with regard to payment of taxes, duties and contributions to social security schemes, that the Candidate has not been convicted of criminal offences and that the Candidate is not subject to bankruptcy, liquidation, reorganisation or similar procedures.
Requirements for the Candidate’s economic and financial standing:
The Candidate must include the following information in part IV, B of the ESPD: Total annual revenue in each of the last 2 (two) financial years available.
Minimum requirement: a total annual revenue of at least 50 000 000 DKK in each of the last 2 (two) financial years available.
If the Candidate relies on the capacities of other entities, revenue is calculated as the Candidate’s and the other entities’ total revenue in each of the last financial years available. For groups of undertakings (e.g.a consortium), revenue is calculated as the undertakings’ total revenue in each of the last financial years available.
Documentation:
The Contracting Authority request that each Candidate submits documentation for the information provided in the ESPD. Such documentation must be submitted along with submission of application to participate.
The following must be provided along with the ESPD as documentation for economic and financial standing:
An auditor-certified statement or statements documenting that the tenderer’s total revenue in each of the last 2 (two) financial years available exceed the minimum requirement of minimum 50 000 000 DKK as far as this information is available depending on when the undertaking was set up or started trading.
For groups of undertakings (e.g. a consortium), the information must be given for each of the participating undertakings in the group.
If, for any valid reason, the Candidate or Tenderer is unable to provide the documents requested by the Contracting Authority, it may prove its economic and financial standing by any other document which the Contracting Authority considers appropriate.
Possibility to rely on the capacities of other entities:
An economic operator participating alone and not relying on the capacities of other entities to meet the selection criteria is only required to complete one ESPD.
An economic operator who is participating alone, but is relying on the capacities of one or more other entities,must ensure that the Contracting Authority receives the economic operator’s own ESPD and a separate ESPD containing relevant information for each of the entities, on which it relies. The relevant information for these entities is part II, A+B and part III as well as the relevant sections of parts IV and V of the ESPD.
If so, the economic operator must document towards the Contracting Authority, in addition to the above-mentioned documentation regarding the economic operator's own capacity and personal circumstances, that the economic operator actually holds the required resources, e.g. by completing section C and onward of the ESPD document, which is an expression of the said entities' obligations in this regard.
It must be specified whether the support is financial and/or technical/professional support and exactly what type of support is offered. Furthermore, it must be documented that the supporting entity is legally responsible towards the Candidate.
Please note that if the Candidate relies on the professional capacity of another entity, it is furthermore are quirement that the supporting entity performs the part of the contract where the support is offered.
If the Candidate relies on the capacity of other entities, the Candidate must furthermore document that this entity/these entities:
1) Fulfil the relevant minimum requirements for suitability, cf. section 140 in the Procurement Act, and
2) They are not subject to the compulsory grounds for exclusion on pages 10-11.
Documentation:
In addition to an ESPD document completed by the supporting economic operator, a declaration of support must be enclosed, which must confirm that a legal obligation exists between the Candidate and the supporting entity.
The Declaration of support form (Template A) enclosed with these tender documents must be used.
Such documentation must be submitted along with submission of application to participate, cf. Section 151 (2).
Cf. section 144 (6) when a Candidate is based on the economic and financial standing of other entities, the Contracting Authority requires that the Candidate and the entity/entities referred to are subject to joint and severable liability for the performance of the contract.
Consortiums (or other associations of undertakings):
Where an application is submitted by a consortium including multiple responsible Candidates, each participating legal entity must be specified individually in a clear and unambiguous way, and the consortium members must also specify a joint authorised representative, who can submit an application on behalf of the consortium.
Furthermore, the consortium (or other associations of undertakings) as a legal entity, will be the entity, with whom Contracting Authority may enter into contract with binding effect on the consortium.
The participants in a consortium or another association of undertakings are jointly and severally liable for both the application, the tender and the potential contract.
If the application is submitted by a consortium, the requested material regarding the undertaking's overall capacity, i.e. financial and technical/professional capacity, must be enclosed.
However, each participating undertaking must document that it is not comprised by the mandatory exclusion criteria by completing an ESPD document, cf. pages 9ff.
Finally, when groups of economic operators, including temporary groups of undertakings, participate in the tender procedure together, a separate ESPD must be completed for each of the economic operators with the information required in parts II to IV of the ESPD.
Documentation:
The Contracting Authority request that each Candidate submits documentation for the information provided in the ESPD.
The following must be submitted as documentation for the Candidate’s reliance on the capacities of other entities:
— consortium Declaration (Template B) demonstrating that the Candidate can effectively draw on the required economic and financial standing and/or technical and professional ability.
The declaration must prove that the entity is under a legal obligation to the tenderer.

Liste og kortfattet beskrivelse af udvælgelseskriterier

Criteria for the selection of Candidates
The Contracting Authority will select 3 (three) to 4 (four) Candidates who will be invited to submit initial tenders. If less than three (3) suitable applications are received, the Contracting Authority will pre-qualify the number of Candidates, who are suitable. These candidates will be invited to submit a tender.
The selection of Candidates invited to submit tenders will be based on an assessment of the Candidate’s technical maturity and professional capacity.
The Contracting Authority will evaluate this based on the Candidate's documented relevant references and the experience gained from the references relevant to the scope of this contract.
The Candidates should include the following information in part IV, C of the ESPD:
References to preferably at least two (2) successful references to comparable projects within the area covered by the tender, within the past (three) years from the date for submission of the application to participate, where the project has either been launched or is ongoing or completed.
By comparable projects, the Contracting Authority intends projects comprising the categories of services included in the tender.
The services of interest are mainly: configuration, integration, migration, test and quality assurance, project management and operation management. The solution delivered in the references should include the core elements of a classical LMS.
If the Candidate uses references for delivery to a plurality of institutions, the specific description must be given for each relevant single institution in this plurality.
The references should each include:
— reference name,
— contact information for a contact person at the reference,
— description of the reference’s size and organization,
— description of the Solution delivery, e.g. development, framework for implementation and operation of the IT solution for learning management based on standard software specific for this reference,
— description of the process used to configure the Solution specific for this reference,
— description of the means used to integrate the Solution, e.g. experience with integration to an Enterprise Service Bus specific for this reference,
— description of the process for data and course migration specific for this reference. E.g. prerequisites, method, volume and results,
— description of the process for test and quality assurance in the delivery of the Solution to the reference,
— description of experience with recognized tools and methods to execute change- and problem management of delivered software,
— description of how the assignment was completed,
— indication of when the assignment was initiated and completed.
The description of the references in the ESPD constitutes the final documentation. However, if the Candidate reaches the limit for characters in the specific text-frame in the ESPD specific references to additional material is accepted.
Below, 7 bullets represent issues that, for each reference, it will weigh favourably for the Candidate to document experience with. The top 5 (five) being the ones that it will weigh most favourable to document experience with, whereas the last 2 (two) bullets will weigh less favourable to document experience with.
— migration of courses and content from a known learning management system to the tenderer's solution. This experience should include migration of courses and content to the same amount and types as described to be the scope of this tender (see Contract Appendix 3, requirement No. 91),
— the development and operation of at least one learning management system including processes for test and quality assurance and ongoing upgrades of the solution,
— integration of key data such as users, courses, classes course/class enrolments, educational structures (hierarchies), calendar information etc. to the Customers existing authoritative systems on the respective data. It will weigh favourably if the Candidate documents experience with service oriented integration,
— continuous agile development on standard software over several years with procedures preventing technical debt and supporting customer specific solutions throughout updates and upgrades,
— organisational complexity. Information about the Contracting Authority is given in the document “Profile UK 2018/19”, https://international.au.dk/about/profile. In this context, attention is drawn to pages 8-9 in the profile. The reference to this profile is provided as a piece of service information only to give an impression of the organizational complexity of the Contracting Authority,
— recognized tools and methods to execute change- and problem management of delivered software,
— using state of the art infrastructure and technology.
The descriptions given will be assessed on the basis of the Contracting Authority's assessment of the Candidate's documented relevant references and the experience gained from the references relevant to the scope of this contract.
The Contracting Authority will look at the information provided as a whole.
The Candidate is urged to provide the required information in this section “Criteria for selection of Candidates” in order for the Contracting Authority to be able to make the selection of Candidates such as described. If this information cannot be stated in the ESPD, a separate document may be attached to the application.
Failure to describe the required information may lead to inability to assess the Candidate’s reference, which may result in a disregard of the reference in the selection process.
The Contracting Authority reserves the right to verify the references.

Præcise oplysninger om fristerne for gennemgangsprocedurer

Appeals regarding the award of the contract must be received by the Complaints Board for Public Procurement 45 days from the day following date of the publication of the Contracting Authority's notice in the Official Journal of the European Union that the Contracting Authority has entered into a contract.
The Contracting Authority must hold a mandatory standstill period of 10 or 15 calendar days from the day following the day on which the Contracting Authority forwarded a notice to the tenderers regarding the contract award.
If the notification has been made by electronic means (e-mail), the Contracting Authority shall at the earliest enter into a contract after the expiry of a standstill period of 10 calendar days.
If the notification has been sent by email, the Contracting Authority shall at the earliest enter into the contract after 15 calendar days.
If the appeal is received by the Complaints Board for Public Procurement before the expiry of the standstill period, the appeal will automatically have temporary suspensive effect until the Complaints Board for Public Procurement has taken a decision on whether the appeal should have suspensive effect or not.
At the latest concurrently with submission of an appeal to the Complaints Board for Public Procurement, the complainant must inform the Contracting Authority of the alleged infringement, and whether the appeal is to be referred to the Board.