IHSI Joint
Horizon Scanning
Database – Tender
About the Tender
The International Horizon Scanning Initiative (IHSI) AISBL is in the process of publishing a tender with the aim of selecting a third-party provider tasked with building and implementing the IHSI Joint Horizon Scanning Database.
Building the database will primarily consist of two elements – an IT and scientific component. The former relates to constructing and maintaining the technical infrastructure required to host the database, while the latter refers to the data collection exercise which will continuously populate the database with information on pharmaceutical products.
The tender will follow a ‘negotiated procedure’ format, allowing several rounds of bidding.
Tender timeline
Publication of Tender
IHSI anticipates that the Request for Candidacy, also commonly known as the RFC, was published on 17 February 2020. The RFC was published at the public registry for tenders in Belgium, which can be found here.
Submission of Proposals
Following publication of the RFC, the tenderer was tasked with submitting relevant documentation. A period of internal screening by the IHSI Selection Committee then began. The Selection Committee shared its findings on the received RFC dossiers with the IHSI Executive Committee, who in turn assessed applicability.
Following a decision on the RFC, candidates that have been accepted received access to the next tendering round, which focusses on the Request for Proposal (RFP). This step represents the main part of the tender procedure, where the actual offers are presented.
The RFP was also published during the second quarter of 2020.
Review and Negotiation
After tender documents from the applicants have been received, and following a period of internal review both by the Selection Committee and IHSI’s Executive Committee, a first selection will be made for further consultation. Based on the outcome of this first selection, IHSI may decide to pursue further rounds of bidding between the remaining candidates.
Award and Start of Technical Implementation
The tender is due to be awarded in the second quarter of 2021, with the database up and running by the end of the year. Irrespective of the outcome, all tenderers will be provided with a response outlining any justifications and judgements as relevant.
First Datasets
Following a period of consultation with the award winner, first datasets are expected at the beginning of 2022. At this point, the database is expected to be populated and High Impact Reports will be forthcoming.
Documents
The tender procedure was launched via the official tendering platform and has now closed.
09:00 CET, 7 October 2020 – Update
The Request for Proposals has now closed. IHSI is in touch with the selected candidates to discuss next steps in the tender process.
09:00 CET, 15 April 2020 – Update
The Request for Candidacies has now closed. IHSI will screen the applications and contact candidates shortly.
09:00 CET, 23 March 2020 – Update
In light of developments surrounding the outbreak of Covid-19, IHSI has extended the deadline for responses to the Requests for Candidacies to 23:59:00, 14 April 2020.
13:00 CET, 13 March 2020 – Update
We have uploaded the following accompanying documents to the Belgian eProcurement site and Tenders Electronic Daily (TED). All documents should be available shortly.
Q&A document
This document outlines a number of answers to questions we have received on the RFC thus far.
Corrected Request for Candidacies
Following the questions received, we clarified information in the RFC and shared the revised document.
Cover letter
This introduces the Q&A document and the rationale behind the changes that have been made to the RFC as a result.