INSTRUCTIONS TO TENDERERS

Reference number: AA-011683-001

Technical Assistance to the implementation of the SWITCH to Circular Economy Value

Chains project

When submitting their tenders, tenderers must follow all instructions, forms, terms of
reference, contract provisions and specifications contained in this tender dossier. Failure
to submit a tender containing all the required information and documentation within the
deadline specified may lead to the rejection of the tender.

When submitting their tenders, tenderers should not include any personal data beyond the
information required in this tender dossier.

These instructions set out the rules for submitting, selecting and implementing contracts financed
under this call for tenders, in conformity with the EIB Corporate & Technical Assistance
Procurement Guide (available here: https://www.eib.org/en/publications/eib-s-corporate-and-
technical-assistance-procurement-guide).

1 Services to be provided

The services required by the Contracting Authority are described in the Terms of Reference. They
are set out in Part B of this tender dossier.

2 Type of contract

Fee-based.

3 Timetable

DATE TIME*

Information meeting (if any) Not applicable

Deadline for requesting clarification from the 30/10/2023 24:00

Contracting Authority

Last date for the Contracting Authority to issue 03/11/2023 -

clarification

Deadline for receipt of tenders by the 15/11/2023 12:00

Contracting Authority

Interviews (if any) Not applicable -

Completion date for evaluating technical offers 08/12/2023 -

Notification of award 15/12/2023 -

Contract signature January 2024 -

Start date January 2024 -

* All times are in the time zone of the country of the Contracting Authority
Provisional date

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 1
4 Participation and subcontracting

a) Participation is open to interested legal and natural persons - participating either individually
or in a grouping (consortium) of tenderers. Participation is also open to international
organisations.

b) No more than one tender can be submitted by a natural or legal person, whatever the form
of participation (as an individual legal entity or as leader or member of a consortium
submitting a tender). If a natural or legal person submits more than one tender, all tenders in
which that person has participated will be excluded.

c) Natural or legal persons are not entitled to participate in this tender procedure or be awarded
a contract if they are in any of the exclusion situations stipulated under Article 57 of European
Parliament and Council Directive 2014/24/EU, or if they are target of a sanction or restrictive
measure1 imposed or administered by the European Union;2 or the United States of America.

Tenderers shall be excluded from this tender procedure if any of the mandatory exclusion
grounds for rejection apply.

Tenderers may be excluded from this tender procedure if any of the discretionary grounds
for exclusion apply.

[for FAFA mandates: Tenderers shall be excluded from this tender procedure if they have
been recorded in the Early Detection and Exclusion System of the EC.]

Tenderers shall be excluded from this tender procedure if they have been recorded on the
list of EIB Exclusion Decisions.

d) Subcontracting is allowed. If the tenderer intends to subcontract one or more parts of the
contracted services, this must be clearly stated in the Organisation and Methodology and the
Tender submission form.

e) Even if subcontracting is allowed, the tenderer must intend to provide the majority of the
services itself except for the tasks entrusted to experts either as natural persons or single-
member companies. In this respect, note that the individual experts recruited for the project
as key or non-key experts are not regarded as sub-contractors.

f) Subcontractors cannot be in any of the exclusion situations stipulated under Article 57 of

European Parliament and Council Directive 2014/24/EU or target of a sanction or restrictive
measure imposed or administered by the European Union; or the United States of America.

g) Whenever requested by the Contracting Authority, the successful tenderer/contractor shall

submit a declaration from the intended subcontractor that it is not in one of the exclusion
situations. In the event of doubt, the Contracting Authority shall request documentary
evidence that the subcontractor is not in a situation of exclusion.

h) If the offer includes subcontracting, it is recommended that the contractual arrangements

between the tenderer and its subcontractors include mediation, according to national and
international practices, as a method of dispute resolution.

1
Being “the target of a sanction or restrictive measure” means the economic operator (i) being listed on a sanctions
list, or (ii) being (directly or indirectly) 50% or more (individually or on aggregate basis) owned or controlled by, or acting
on behalf of or at the direction of, a person or entity listed on, any sanctions lists, or (iii) being located or resident in, or
organised or incorporated under the laws of a Sanctioned Country, or owned or controlled by, or acting on behalf or at the
direction of such a person or entity. A “Sanctioned Country” shall mean a country or territory that is, or whose government
is, at any time, the target of comprehensive country or territory-wide sanction or restrictive measure imposed or
administered by the competent authorities described in this sub-section (h).
2
Pursuant to Chapter 2 of Title V of the Treaty on European Union or Article 215 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the
European Union, either autonomously or pursuant to the sanctions decided by the United Nations Security Council on the
basis of Article 41 of the UN Charter.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 2
5 Selection criteria

The following selection criteria will be applied to tenderers. Where tenders are submitted by a
consortium, these selection criteria will be applied to the consortium as a whole, and not to each
member of the consortium individually.
Undertaking: Relying on the capacity of other entities
With regard to criteria relating to economic and financial standing and to criteria relating to
technical and professional ability, an economic operator could, where appropriate and for a
particular contract, rely on the capacities of other entities, regardless of the legal nature of the
links which it has with them.

With regard to economic and financial criteria, the entities upon whose capacity the tenderer relies
become jointly and severally liable for the execution of the contract.
With regard to technical and professional criteria, an economic operator may only rely on the
capacities of other entities where the latter will perform the works or services for which
these capacities are required. In such case, the tenderer shall describe in its strategy the
undertaking arrangements with clear indications of the resources the tenderer plans to rely on and
in which conditions the support will apply (Please refer to Section 6.1 (3) below).
Where the tenderer relies on the capacities of other entities, it must prove to the Contracting
Authority that it will have at its disposal the resources necessary for performance of the contract,
by producing a commitment (refer to the letter of undertaking model - Part C.01 of this tender
dossier) on the part of those entities to place those resources at its disposal. Such entities, for
instance the parent company of the economic operator, must respect the same rules of eligibility
and must fulfil the same relevant selection criteria as the economic operator. The contracting
authority shall verify whether there are grounds for exclusion. The contracting authority shall
require that the economic operator replaces an entity which does not meet a relevant selection
criterion, or in respect of which there are compulsory grounds for exclusion. The contracting
authority may require that the economic operator substitutes an entity in respect of which there
are non-compulsory grounds for exclusion.

5.1 Economic and financial capacity of tenderer

Based on item 3 of the tender submission form. In case the tenderer (leader or any of the
members of the consortium) is a public body, equivalent information should be provided.
Legal persons:

(a) The annual turnover of the tenderer (individual legal entity or consortium overall) must
be of at least EUR 3 000 000 for each of the last 3 years for which accounts have been
closed.

Note to tenderers: In the tender form, please make sure to specify the actual financial
year(s) for which the data is provided.

5.2 Professional capacity of tenderer

Based on items 4 of the tender submission form.

Legal persons:

(a) The number of the permanent staff of the tenderer (individual legal entity or consortium
overall) currently working in fields related to this contract (i.e green/climate finance,
banking, SME support, circular economy, industrial value chains or other related fields),
must be at least 6 for each of the last 3 years (2023, 2022, 2021).

Note to tenderers: In the tender form, please make sure to specify the actual year for which
the data is provided.

5.3 Technical capacity of tenderer

Based on items 5 of the tender submission form.

Legal persons:

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 3
 a) The tenderer (individual company or consortium altogether) has implemented at least
2 projects compliant with the following characteristics:
Period of implementation From 01/01/2019 to deadline for submission
Minimum contract value (EUR) 300,000
On-going assignments eligible? Yes
Country/region Worldwide
Minimum participation (%) Minimum 50% in case the entity was a member of a
consortium.
Minimum 35% in case the entity was Leader of a
consortium.
Scope of eligible activities Advisory support or capacity development to
carried out commercial banks on SME finance related to
sustainable/climate investments (incl. climate-related
reporting and/or development of a green portfolio or
green products)
Other characteristics and/or Not applicable
requirements

b) The tenderer (individual company or consortium altogether) has implemented at least

one project compliant with the following characteristics:
Period of implementation From 01/01/2019 to deadline for submission
Minimum contract value (EUR) 100,000
On-going assignments eligible? Yes
Eligible country/region Worldwide
Minimum participation (%) Minimum 50% in case the entity was a member of a
consortium.
Minimum 35% in case the entity was Leader of a
consortium.
Scope of eligible activities Support to private or public entities in the field of circular
carried out economy and/or environmental sustainability of
industrial value chains.
Other characteristics and/or The type of services provided may include technical
requirements studies, capacity building, policy development and or
implementation, financial advisory for investments,
sustainability strategy.

c) At least one project compliant with the criteria a) or b) above have been implemented in the
Southern Neighbourhood countries3
Note to tenderers :

i. Each project presented as reference may be used to fulfil one or more criteria.
ii. The number of references to be provided must not exceed 6 references.

iii. the project references submitted must have been completed at any time within the
reference period, although they may have started earlier.

3
Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, the Palestinian territories, Syria and
Tunisia

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 4
 iv. Projects presented as references must consist of a single contract (and addenda). In
the case of framework contracts/agreements, only specific contracts corresponding
to assignments implemented under such framework contracts (call-offs) shall be
included and shall be considered. Cumulating several call-offs contracts implemented
under a specific framework contract/agreement is not permitted and will not be
considered.
v. Only for the selection criteria for which on-going contract are accepted: The
tenderer may present as reference a part of a contract which has been successfully
completed, even though the contract is still on-going. In this case, only the portion of
the services that have been successfully completed will be considered, and must
comply will all the selection criteria (notably in terms of date of completion, value of
services, tenderer’s % contribution % of participation of the entity). As for any other
references (see below), the tenderer must be able to provide documentary evidence
to prove the accuracy of the information provided in the references.
vi. Where the projects referenced have been implemented by consortia comprising two
or more of the members now associated as a consortium for this tender procedure,
their respective percentages shall be added together, in order for the tender to be
assessed on the basis of the consortium as a whole.
vii. Previous experience which caused breach of contract and termination by a
Contracting Authority shall not be used as reference.

viii. The documentary evidence for the references presented should only be
provided in case of notification of award (see section 17.2 below. The
document(s) presented as documentary evidence (such as performance or
completion certificates from the client) should clearly mention, as a minimum, the title
of the project, the name of the entity, the dates of implementation and the value of the
services provided.

ix. The information provided in the reference must be accurate and explicit enough with
regards to the selection criteria. The evaluation committee will assess the references
against the selection criteria solely on the basis of the information provided in the
reference.

6 Content of tenders

The offers, all correspondence and documents related to the tender exchanged by the tenderer
and the Contracting Authority must be written in English.
Supporting documents submitted by the tenderer may be in another language, provided they are
accompanied by a translation into the language of the procedure. For the purposes of
interpreting the tender, the language of the procedure has precedence.
The tender must comprise a Technical offer and a Financial offer, which must be submitted in
accordance with item 10 below.

6.1 Technical offer

The Technical offer must include the following documents:

(1) The tender submission form (included in Part C.01 of this tender dossier)

Note that any additional documentation (brochure, letter, etc) sent with the Tender Submission
Form will not be taken into consideration.

(2) Declarations, legal and administrative files.

For each legal entity identified in section 1 of the tender submission form, the
following documents should be submitted:

a) The signed tenderer’s declaration, using the template included in Part C.01 of this
tender dossier

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 5
 b) The signed Declaration(s) of honour on exclusion and selection criteria and on the
absence of conflict of interest using the template included in Part C.01 of this tender
dossier. This declaration must also be provided by capacity-providing entities (if any).

The Contracting Authority will accept the European Single Procurement Document
(ESPD) as an alternative to the declaration.

c) The legal entity file(s), using the template included in Part C.02 of this tender dossier,
together with a copy of the company’s official registration,

d) Duly authorised signature: an official document (statutes, power of attorney, notary

statement, etc.) proving that the person who signs on behalf of the entity is duly
authorised to do so. Please highlight in the document and the place in the respective
document where this authorisation is mentioned.

e) The Tender Submission Datasheet, using the template included in Part C.07 of the
tender dossier, to be submitted in editable excel format.

(3) Organisation and methodology (will become Annex III to the contract), to be drawn up by
the tenderer using the following instructions:

Rationale

- Any comments on the Terms of reference of importance for the successful execution of
activities, in particular its objectives and expected results, thus demonstrating the
degree of understanding of the contract. An opinion on the key issues related to the
achievement of the contract objectives and expected results.

- An explanation of the risks and assumptions affecting the execution of the contract
including those identified in the Termes of Reference and beyond. The Consultant will
provide a risk analysis including the likelihood of risks and their level of impact. In
addition, the tenderer will propose adequate mitigation measures.

Strategy

- An outline of the approach proposed for contract implementation.

- A description of the proposed activities considered to be necessary to achieve the

contract objectives. This description will explain how these activities will be
implemented and which resources are considered necessary to their implementation
(See below).

- The related inputs (human resources, time inputs and use of incidental expenditure,
etc.) and outputs / deliverables of each of these activities. A description of the team
organisation - roles & responsibilities of the experts involved.

- In the case of a tender being submitted by a consortium, a description of the input from
each of the consortium members and the distribution and interaction of tasks and
responsibilities between them. Furthermore, the involvement of all members of the
consortium will be considered added value in the tender evaluation. If the tender is
submitted by a single company, the total of available points for this part in the evaluation
grid will be allocated.

- A description of the support facilities (backstopping) that the team of experts will have
from the tenderer during the execution of the contract.

- If applicable, a description of sub-contracting arrangements foreseen, with a clear

indication of the tasks that will be entrusted to a sub-contractor and a statement by the
tenderer guaranteeing the eligibility of any sub-contractor.

- If applicable, a description of the undertaking arrangements with clear indications of the

resources the tenderer plans to rely on and in which conditions the support will apply.

Activities and resources schedule

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 6
 - The timing, sequence and duration of the proposed activities.

- The identification and timing of major milestones in execution of the contract, including
an indication of how the achievement of these would be reflected in any reports,
particularly those stipulated in the Terms of reference.

- The estimated allocation of resources per expert and per activity.

- The estimated number of days of the experts (or expert categories) during the project
period of implementation

Note: the Organisation and Methodology, shall not exceed 30 pages. The document should
we written using Arial 10 or an equivalent font size (ie Calibri 11, Time New Roman 11, etc…),
normal margins and spacing.

Failure to comply with this requirement will lead to a reduction of up to 2 points of the score
allocated to the Organisation and Methodology.

(4) Key Experts (to become Annex IV to the contract).

a) Signed statements of exclusivity and availability for each key expert (using the
template C.03 included in the tender dossier). The purpose of the statement of
exclusivity and availability of is the following:

- The key experts proposed in this tender must not be part of any other tender submitted
for this tender procedure. They must therefore commit themselves exclusively to the
tenderer.

- Each key expert must undertake to be available, able and willing to work for the whole
period scheduled for his/her input to implement the tasks set out in the Terms of
Reference and/or in the Organisation and methodology.

Note that non-key experts must not be asked to sign statements of exclusivity and
availability.

Any expert working on another project, where the input from his/her position to that
contract is not compatible with the inputs required for his/her activities under this
contract, must not be proposed as a key expert for this contract under any
circumstances. Consequently, the expert may participate in parallel tender procedures
but must inform the Contracting Authority of these in the Statement of Exclusivity and
Availability. Furthermore, the expert is expected to notify the tenderer immediately if
he/she is successful in another tender procedure and he/she is expected to accept the
first engagement offered to him/her chronologically.
If a key expert is proposed as a key expert by more than one tenderer with the agreement
of the key expert, the corresponding tenders will be rejected.
Having selected a firm partly on the basis of an evaluation of the key experts presented
in the tender, the Contracting Authority expects the contract to be executed by these
specific experts. However, after the award letter, the selected tenderer may propose
replacements for the key experts under certain conditions (for further information see
point 17).
b) The CVs of each of the Key Experts. Each CV should be no longer than 3 pages and
only one CV must be provided for each position identified in the Terms of Reference. In
case of CVs longer than 3 pages, only the first 3 pages will be taken into account.

The qualifications and experience of each Key Expert must clearly match the profiles
indicated in the Terms of Reference. If an expert does not meet the requirements for
each evaluation criterion (i.e. qualification and skills, general professional experience
and specific professional experience), he/she will be assessed accordingly (see the note
below at 14.2).

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 7
 The CVs of Non-key experts should not be submitted.
(5) Documentary evidence for the Key Experts

Tenderers must provide the following documents for each Key Experts proposed:

- a copy of the diplomas mentioned in their CVs,

- a copy of employer certificates or references proving the professional experience
indicated in their CVs.

Only diplomas and documented experience will be taken into account. Previous
experience which caused breach of contract and termination shall not be used as
reference.
If the documentary evidence submitted is not written into the language of the procedure,
a translation into this language must be attached. Documentary proof or statements may
be in original or copy. If copies are submitted, the originals must be available to send to
the Contracting Authority upon request.

Tenderers are reminded that the provision of false information in this tender procedure
may lead to the rejection of their tender and to their exclusion from EIB tender procedures
and contracts.

6.2 Financial offer

Tenderers are reminded that the maximum budget available for this contract, as stated in the
contract notice, is EUR 1 500 000. Payments under this contract will be made in the currency of
the tender.

The Financial offer must be presented in Euro using the template included in the part C.04 of this
tender dossier).

To complete the spreadsheet:

1) Enter the fee rates for each category of expert in the worksheet ‘Budget breakdown’

2) Enter the estimated numbers of working days for each category of expert according to your
organisation and methodology and in line with the Terms of Reference in the worksheet
‘Budget breakdown’

3) Enter the provision for incidental expenditure as given in the Terms of Reference in the
worksheet ‘Budget breakdown’

4) Enter the amount for Lumpsums activities defined in the Terms of Reference in the worksheet
‘Budget breakdown’

5) Enter the amount for the provision for expenditure verification as given in the Terms of
Reference in the first worksheet ‘Budget breakdown’.

7 Variant solutions

Tenderers are not authorised to tender for a variant in addition to this tender.

8 Period during which tenders are binding

Tenderers are bound by their tenders for 6 months after the deadline for submitting tenders.
The Contracting Authority may ask the tenderers to extend the period as deemed necessary.

9 Additional information before the deadline for submitting tenders

The tender dossier should be clear enough to avoid tenderers having to request additional
information during the procedure.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 8
Tenderers may submit questions in writing by the deadline specified in item 3 above exclusively
via the eTendering platform. Requests not submitted via the eTendering platform will not be
considered. The eTendering platform contains a questions/answers section permitting tenderers
to send questions within the deadline specified above and consult the Contracting Authority’s
replies.
The Contracting Authority has no obligation to provide clarification to requests transmitted after
this date.
The Contracting Authority will publish its replies on this platform by the deadline specified in item
3 above and at least 6 calendar days before the deadline for submission of tenders.
Any tenderer seeking to arrange individual meetings with the Contracting Authority and/or the
Promoter concerning this contract during the tender period may be excluded from the tender
procedure.
No information meeting and no site visit is foreseen. Visits by individual prospective tenderers
during the tender period cannot be organised by the Contracting Authority or the Promoter.

10 Submission of tenders

Tenders must be submitted electronically only, in line with the following instructions:
Tenderers must express their intention to submit a tender by e-mail to the following address: glo-
[email protected] until 48 hours before the deadline for submission specified in section
3 at the latest.
24 hours before the deadline for submission specified in section 3, the tenderers who expressed
their intention to submit a tender will receive a link to upload their proposals on the EIB’s secured
“Smartshare” platform.
The full offer (including the technical and financial offer) must be uploaded before the deadline for
submission mentioned in section 3.

10.1 Technical proposal

As described in section 6.1 above, the technical proposal must be submitted in separate pdf
files, as follows:
1. One (1) PDF file including the Tender Submission Form

2. For each legal entity identified under section 1 of the Tender Submission Form, one (1)
PDF including a) the tenderer’s declaration, b) the declaration of honour on exclusion and
selection criteria and on the absence of conflict of interest, c) the Legal entity file, d) the
entity’s registration official documents, e) the power of signature, f) if applicable, the
letter(s) of undertaking of the capacity providing entities accompanied by the
“declaration(s) of honour on exclusion and selection criteria and on the absence of conflict
of interest” of the capacity providing entities.

3. One (1) PDF file including the Tenderer’s Organisation and Methodology

4. One (1) PDF file including the CVs of the Key Experts,

5. One (1) PDF file including the supporting documents for the Key Experts (their respective
statements of exclusivity and availability, diplomas and employer certificates or
references).

6. One (1) EXCEL file including the Tender Submission Datasheet, using the template in
Part C.07 of the tender dossier.

The PDF files shall be submitted in searchable pdf format and the name of each file should include
the tender reference (AA-011683-001) and the name of the tenderer (only the name of the leader
in case the tender is submitted by a consortium). Whenever relevant, the PDF files should include
bookmarks to facilitate the navigating through the document.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 9
10.2 Financial proposal

The financial proposal must be submitted as follows:

1. One PDF file including the financial offer.

The PDF file of the financial proposal must be password-protected. The Contracting
authority will request the password to open the PDF file only after completion of the evaluation
of the technical proposals, and only to those tenderers whose technical proposal achieved a
score of 80% or more (see section 14.5 below).

Please note: It is the responsibility of the tenderer to ensure that the files are duly protected
and that the password is valid. In case the files are not password protected or cannot be
opened, the tenderers will not be allowed to resubmit a new financial offer file and their
offer shall be rejected.

10.3 Signature

The administrative documents (forms and declarations) may be signed electronically. In case of
wet ink signature, an original copy of the documents may be requested to the awarded tenderer
prior to the contract signature.

Tenders submitted by any other means will not be considered.

Any infringement of these rules (e.g., unprotected files / or references to price in the
technical offer) constitutes an irregularity which will lead to rejection of the tender.

11 Amending or withdrawing tenders

Tenderers may amend or withdraw their tenders on EIB’s “SmartShare” platform prior to the
deadline for submitting tenders. Tenders may not be amended after this deadline, and the access
to the platform will be deactivated after the deadline for submission.

12 Costs for preparing tenders

No costs incurred by the tenderer in preparing and submitting the tender are reimbursable. All
such costs must be borne by the tenderer, including the cost of interviewing proposed experts.

13 Ownership of tenders

The Contracting Authority retains ownership of all tenders received under this tendering
procedure. Consequently, tenderers do not have the right to have their tenders returned to them.

14 Evaluation of tenders and award criteria

14.1 Compliance with the selection criteria

The compliance of the tenderers with the requirements of the selection criteria (see item 5 of these
Instructions to tenderers) will be analysed at the beginning of the evaluation process. Non-
compliance will lead to the rejection of the tender.

14.2 Evaluation of technical offers

For the offers submitted by tenderers fulfilling the selection criteria, the quality of each technical
offer will be evaluated in accordance with the award criteria and the associated weighting as
detailed in section 15.3 below. No other award criteria will be used. The award criteria will be
examined in accordance with the requirements as indicated in the Terms of reference (Part B of
this tender dossier).
Only offers that achieve a score of 80 or more are declared 'technically accepted'. Any tender
falling short of the 80-points threshold will be automatically rejected.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 10
Out of the tenders reaching the 80-point threshold, the best technical offer is awarded 100 points.
The others receive points calculated using the following formula:

Final score of the technical offer in question

Technical score = X 100
Final score of the best technical offer

14.3 Evaluation grid

The technical proposal will be scored in accordance with the following grid:
Maximum score
Organisation and methodology 40
Rationale 10
Strategy 26
Timetable of activities 4
Key experts 60
Key expert 1 25
Qualifications and skills 4
General professional experience 8
Specific professional experience 13
Key expert 2 20
Qualifications and skills 3
General professional experience 6
Specific professional experience 11
Key expert 3 15
Qualifications and skills 3
General professional experience 4
Specific professional experience 8
Overall total score 100
The content of the Organisation and Methodology is described in section 6.1.3 of the document.
The profile of the Key Experts is described in the Terms of Reference.
Note for the evaluation of key experts: Key Experts will be scored against the requirements
stated in the Terms of Reference. For the evaluation of the key experts, the 80% will serve as a
guideline. This means that when an expert is technically acceptable on a particular criterion (when
he/she fulfils the requirement for that criterion as it is described in the ToRs), 80% of the maximum
score foreseen for that criterion will be allocated. If the expert exceeds the requirement described
in the Tors for that criterion, a percentage between 81 and 100% of the maximum score foreseen
for that criterion will be allocated, depending on by how much the expert exceeds the requirement.
If the expert’s experience goes below the requirement described in ToRs for that criterion he/she
will be scored accordingly, a percentage below 80% will be allocated, depending on by how much
the expert’s experience is below the requirement.

14.4 Interviews

No interviews are foreseen.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 11
14.5 Evaluation of financial offers

Upon completion of the technical evaluation, the PDF file of the financial offers (see section 11
above) for tenders that were not eliminated during the technical evaluation will be opened (i.e.
those with an average score of 80 points or more). Tenders exceeding the maximum budget
specified in Section 6.2 above will be eliminated.
The tender with the lowest price (fees + lump sums and/or incidentals + expenditure verification)
receives 100 points. The others are awarded points by means of the following formula:
Lowest price of the technically compliant tenders
Financial score = X 100
Price of the tender being considered
Any arithmetical errors are corrected without penalty to the tenderer such that, if there is a
discrepancy between a fee rate and the total amount derived from multiplying the fee rate by the
corresponding number of working days, the fee rate as quoted must prevail, unless the opinion of
the Evaluation Committee contains an obvious error in the fee rate, in which event the total amount
as quoted must prevail and the fee rate must be corrected.

14.6 Choice of selected tenderer

The tender is awarded according to the best quality-price ratio, established by weighing
technical quality against price on an 80/20 basis.

This is done by adding:

- the technical scores awarded to the technical offers multiplied by 0.80

and

- the financial scores awarded to the financial offers multiplied by 0.20

15 Confidentiality

The entire evaluation procedure is confidential. The Evaluation Committee's decisions are
collective and its deliberations are held in closed session. The members of the Evaluation
Committee are bound to secrecy. The evaluation reports and written records, in particular, are
confidential and may be communicated neither to the tenderers nor to any party other than the
Contracting Authority, and where applicable, the European Commission, the European Anti-Fraud
Office and the European Court of Auditors.

16 Ethics clauses / Corruptive practices

a) Any attempt by a tenderer to obtain confidential information, enter into unlawful agreements
with competitors or influence the Evaluation Committee or the Contracting Authority during
the process of examining, clarifying, evaluating and comparing tenders will lead to the
rejection of its tender and may result in administrative penalties.

b) The tenderer must not be affected by any conflict of interest and must have no equivalent
relation in that respect with other tenderers or parties involved in the current assignment.

c) The European Investment Bank reserves the right to suspend or cancel project financing if
corrupt practices of any kind are discovered at any stage of the award process or during the
execution of a contract. For the purposes of this provision, ‘corrupt practices’ are the offer of
a bribe, gift, gratuity or commission to any person as an inducement or reward for performing
or refraining from any act relating to the award of a contract or execution of a contract already
concluded with the Contracting Authority.

d) Tenders will be rejected or contracts terminated if it emerges that the award or execution of
a contract has given rise to unusual commercial expenses. Such unusual commercial
expenses are commissions not mentioned in the main contract or not stemming from a
properly concluded contract referring to the main contract, commissions not paid in return for
any actual and legitimate service, commissions remitted to a tax haven, commissions paid to

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 12
 a payee who is not clearly identified or commissions paid to a company which has every
appearance of being a front company.

e) The Contracting Authority reserves the right to suspend or cancel the procedure, where the
award procedure proves to have been subject to substantial errors, irregularities or fraud. If
substantial errors, irregularities or fraud are discovered after the award of the Contract, the
Contracting Authority may refrain from concluding the Contract.

17 Signature of contract

17.1 Notification of award

The successful tenderer will be informed in writing that its tender has been accepted.
The successful tenderer shall then confirm availability or unavailability of their Key-Experts within
5 days from the date of the notification of award.
In case of unavailability the tenderer will be allowed to propose replacement key-expert(s). The
successful tenderer shall give due justification for the exchange of the key-expert but the
acceptance will not be limited to specific cases. Several replacement key-experts may be
proposed but only one time-period of 15 days from the date of the notification of award will be
offered. The replacement key-expert(s) cannot be an expert proposed by another tenderer in the
same call for tender.
The replacement key-expert's total score must be at least as high as the scores of the key-expert
proposed in the tender. It must be emphasised that the minimum requirements for each evaluation
criteria must be met by the replacement expert.
If replacement key-experts are not proposed within the 15 days delay or if the replacement experts
are not sufficiently qualified, or that the proposal of the replacement key-expert amends the award
conditions which took place, the Contracting Authority may decide to award the contract to the
second best technically compliant tenderer (also giving them a chance to replace a key-expert
should he/she not be available).
Should the Contracting Authority learn that a tenderer has confirmed the availability of a key expert
and signed the contract although the tenderer has deliberately concealed the fact that the key-
expert is unavailable from the date specified in the tender dossier for the start of the assignment,
the Contracting Authority may decide to terminate the contract on the basis article 36.3 (m) of the
General Conditions>.

17.2 Documentary evidence required from the successful tenderer

Before the Contracting Authority signs the contract with the successful tenderer, the latter
must provide the additional information and documentary evidence listed below.

(1) Documentary proof or statements required under the law of the country in which the company
(or each of the companies for consortia) is effectively established, to show that it is not in any
of the exclusion situations stipulated under Article 57 of European Parliament and Council
Directive 2014/24/EU. This evidence, documents or statements must be dated, no more than
one year before the date of submission of the tender. In addition, a statement must be
furnished stating that the situations described in these documents have not changed since
then.

If the nature of your entity is such that it cannot fall into the exclusion situations and/or cannot
provide the documents indicated above (for instance, national public administrations and
international organisations), please provide a declaration explaining this situation.

The Contracting Authority may waive the obligation of any tenderer to submit the
documentary evidence referred to above if such evidence has already been submitted for the
purposes of another procurement procedure, provided that the issue date of the documents
does not exceed one year and that they are still valid. In this case, the tenderer must declare
on his/her honour that the documentary evidence has already been provided in a previous
procurement procedure and confirm that his/her situation has not changed.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 13
(2) Documentary evidence of the financial and economic capacity as well as the technical and
professional capacity according to the selection criteria specified in item 5 above. In case the
documentary evidence for the technical capacity was not requested in section 5.3, the list of
qualifying references will be communicated in the notification of award letter and you will be
only requested to submit documentary evidence for these references.

If the documentary evidence submitted is not written into the language of the procedure, a
translation into this language must be attached. Documentary proof or statements may be in
original or copy. If copies are submitted, the originals must be available to send to the Contracting
Authority upon request.

If the successful tenderer fails to provide the documentary evidence listed above within
15 calendar days following the notification of award or if the successful tenderer is found to have
provided false information, the award will be considered null and void. In such a case, the
Contracting Authority may award the tender to another tenderer or cancel the tender procedure.

17.3 Signature of the contract(s)

Within 30 days of receipt of the contract, the selected tenderer shall sign and date the contract
and return it to the Contracting Authority.

Failure of the selected tenderer to comply with this requirement may constitute grounds for
annulling the decision to award the contract. In this event, the Contracting Authority may award
the tender to another tenderer or cancel the tender procedure.

Preferably, the contract is expected to be signed digitally by the authorised representatives using
their qualified electronic signature (QES) in compliance with EU Regulation No 910/2014 (eIDAS
Regulation).

The other tenderers will, at the same time as the notification of award is submitted, be informed
that their tenders were not retained by standard letter, including an indication of the relative
weaknesses of their tender by way of a comparative table of the scores for the winning tender and
the unsuccessful tender. The second-best tenderer is informed of the notification of award to the
successful tenderer with the reservation of the possibility to receive a notification of award in case
of inability to sign the contract with the first ranked tenderer. Then, the tender of the second-best
tenderer remains valid as specified in Section 8. The second tenderer may refuse the award of
the contract if, when receiving a notification of award, the validity of their tender has expired.

The Contracting Authority will furthermore, at the same time, also inform the remaining
unsuccessful tenderers and the consequence of these letters will be that the validity of their offers
must not be retained.

The corresponding contract award notice will be published on the website

http://ted.europa.eu/TED/main/HomePage.do.

18 Cancellation of the tender procedure

In the event of cancellation of the tender procedure, the Contracting Authority will notify tenderers
of the cancellation. If the tender procedure is cancelled before the outer envelope of any tender
has been opened, the unopened and sealed envelopes will be returned to the tenderers.

Cancellation may occur, for example, where:

 the tender procedure has been unsuccessful, i.e., no suitable, qualitatively or financially
acceptable tender has been received or there is no valid response at all;

 there are fundamental changes to the economic or technical data of the project;

 exceptional circumstances or force majeure render normal performance of the contract

impossible;

 all technically acceptable tenders exceed the financial resources available;

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 14
 there have been substantial errors, irregularities or frauds in the procedure, in particular if they
have prevented fair competition;

 the award is not in compliance with sound financial management, i.e. does not respect the
principles of economy, efficiency and effectiveness (e.g. the price proposed by the tenderer
to whom the contract is to be awarded is objectively disproportionate with regard to the price
of the market);

 The cooperation agreements with the promoters are not signed.

In no event shall the Contracting Authority be liable for any damages whatsoever including, without
limitation, damages for loss of profits, in any way connected with the cancellation of a tender
procedure, even if the Contracting Authority has been advised of the possibility of damages. The
publication of a contract notice does not commit the Contracting Authority to implement the
programme or project announced.

19 Privacy Statement

During the tender procedure the EIB will get access to certain personal data (information related
to an identified or identifiable natural person). EIB’s Privacy statement, available at
https://www.eib.org/en/privacy/procurement.htm, provides information about the collection and
use of personal data in the context of procurement procedures.

20 Other provisions

 The maximum budget available for this contract is EUR 1 500 000 and consists of 2 distinct
tranches:

- A firm tranche of EUR 700 000 corresponding to the signed financial commitment
between the EIB and UNIDO.

- A conditional tranche of EUR 800 000 which is subject to a second financial

commitment that will require an amendment to the agreement between the EIB and
UNIDO. The conditional tranche will therefore be activated, by written notification to the
Consultant, subject to availability of funds. In case the second financial commitment
from the UNIDO does not materialize before the fund available under the firm tranche
are fully utilized, the contract will be suspended. In no event shall the Contracting
Authority be liable for any damages whatsoever including, without limitation, damages for
loss of profits/costs in any way connected with the suspension.

The Consultant shall not incur any services or expenses above the amount of the firm
tranche without the prior written notification from the EIB.

The tenderers should note that the firm tranche is not time based.

 This tender procedure is launched with “suspension clause”. This entails that the award of the
contract is subject to the signing of a Cooperation Agreement between the EIB and the
Promoters. The tenderers interested in participating in this tender procedure must be fully aware
that in no event shall the Contracting Authority be liable for any damages whatsoever including,
without limitation, damages for loss of profits/costs incurred by the tenderer in preparing and
submitting his tender, in any way connected with the cancellation of the tender procedure on the
ground of the “suspension clause” even if the Contracting Authority has been advised of the
possibility of damages. As such, by submitting their tender, the tenderer accepts in full the use of
the “suspension clause” in this tender procedure as well as its possible consequences.]>

 The Consultant is expected to quote the price net of any taxes.

Under article 21 of the Protocol of the Privileges and Immunities of the European Union
(C_2012326EN.01020101.xml (europa.eu)) and article 151(b) of Council Directive 2006/112/EC
on the common system of value added tax, the EIB benefits from VAT exemption on its
purchases in Member States of the European Union. In its capacity as a Community body, the
EIB is not liable to VAT and consequently has no VAT number. An intra-Community VAT

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 15
 exemption certificate (15.10 form) may be provided to you, should you require such document to
enable you to justify to the local tax authorities the issuing of an invoice excluding VAT.

At the same time, note that – even if local tax exemption is obtained – any equipment
procured/imported in the beneficiary country/ies to facilitate the technical assistance operation,
and which will remain the property of the Contractor after the end of the period of
implementation of the contract, might be subject to payment of (residual) local taxes and such
taxes are not to be invoiced to the Contracting Authority.

 Any dispute concerning procurement conducted by the EIB would fall under the jurisdiction of
the European Court of Justice.

21 Scope for additional services

The contracting authority may, at its own discretion and subject to the availability of funding,
extend the scope and duration of the project to cover additional or complementary services. More
specifically, additional services may be required to scale up the number of beneficiaries benefiting
from the SWITCH to Circular Economy programme, and/or to increase the number of pilot
projects, and/or to cover additional value chains. Extension in time may also be required in case
of delays in the implementation of the task due to circumstances outside the control of the
Consultant.
The maximum contract extension will be for 100 % of the initial value and 100 % of the initial
duration.

AA-011683-001_Instructions to Tenderers 16