The cost of implementing electronic Public Procurement (ePP) practices has been identified as one of the main barriers for the deployment of ePP solutions in the EU. ELLECTRA-WeB is a research project co-funded by FP6 with the objective of minimizing the costs and efforts associated with the realization of ePP solutions. The primarily goal of ELLECTRA-WeB is to specify, develop and test an Open-source Application Framework for ePP that will enable, on the one hand, ICT developers to cost-effectively develop, and, on the other hand, Public Administrations and Suppliers to easily adopt and use interoperable, user-friendly, secure and EU compliant ePP solutions. The ePP Application Framework adheres to the latest IDABC guidelines to support compliance with the EU legislation framework. Due to the fact that the Framework follows the Model Driven Engineering approach of software development, all required components of an ePP solution are specified in the form of UML models. Although, the workflow for each public procurement procedure is fixed within the Framework, so as to ensure that an ePP solution generated by it will follow the EU directives, customization of its components is easily supported. A developer is free to customize, extend, and combine pre-existing models provided by the Framework or design his own. A highly intelligent model transformation engine bundled with the Framework ensures up to 70-80% of the required code is automatically generated from the models. Initially the Framework will support the Open & Restricted procedures of Public Contracts. In 2008, it will be verified by four Public Procurement Agencies, before its final version is released in 2009. Having in mind that by 2010, all EU administrations should have the capability of carrying out 100% of their procurement electronically, the ELLLECTRA-WeB Framework intends to become the enabling infrastructure for developing ePP solutions in the EU.

Policy Context

The legal and policy framework for Public Procurement at EU Member States is principally set out in Directives 92/50/EEC, 93/36/EEC, 93/37/EEC and 97/52/EEC. These EC Public Procurement Directives assume traditional and certainly non-electronic processes and means. However, the EC has recently recast the above Directives in view of the new developments in ICT and the simplifications these can bring in terms of the efficiency and transparency of the procurement processes. The new EC public procurement Directives 2004/17/EC and 2004/18/EC, published in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) on 30 April 2004, introduce electronic procurement in government with the objective to open up public procurement markets in the EU, while promoting competitive public purchasing and removing preferential practices. The aim of the Directives is not to re-invent e-procurement for the public sector but rather to make sure that any business with a PC, internet connection and some basic knowledge of public procurement can tender for contracts across Europe. A further impetus in this regard is given by the proposed Directive of The European Parliament and of the Council on services in the internal market (Comm (2004)2) that sets out a legally binding obligation for Member States to co-operate effectively at the administrative level in order to avoid malfunctions of the internal market.

Description of target users and groups

The targeted ELLECTRA-WeB clients identified both in the WB and EU markets are ICT developers and public organizations. ICT developers will exploit the open-source Application Framework primarily in order to develop an ePP solution for Public Organizations. Alternatively, their exploitation approach will assume improvement of the developed Application Framework in order to use it as a starting point for future research projects. Public organizations such as public procurement authorities, ministries, public utilities, NGOs etc.will be envisaged to invite through an open tender ICT developers to develop an ePP solution and provide supporting services such as customization, maintenance, hosting etc.

Description of the way to implement the initiative

The ELLECTRA-WeB project will facilitate the adoption of electronic Public procurement in Western Balkan Organizations and Suppliers by making available a vertical model-driven ePP solution development environment that speed up the complete process and decrease the costs. Its overall strategy is to exploit the ePP Application framework as open-source software at a Pan-European level. Within the Western Balkan region, project partners will support the take-up of ePP solutions, which will serve for the entire European market. The implementation plan is oriented to: (a) the support of success pilots developments in the Western Balkan region that will demonstrate the applicability, feasibility and benefits of the ePP Application Framework; (b) the review of the available Open-source licensing schemes (including the selection of the most appropriate licenses for this framework) that will involve the development of a business model for the selected license registration, as well as, delineating a plan for setting up an open source community; (c) the exploitation of Supporting Guidelines as a constituent of supporting services that will be offered in addition to the ePP Application framework.

Technology solution

The ELLECTRA-WeB approach consists in facilitating the deployment of electronic Public Procurement services in the Western Balkan region by means of a domain-specific solutions’ production environment. This approach uses an innovative combination of MDE and SOA technologies that are selected to cost-effectively develop ePP that will facilitate integration, interoperability, easy maintenance and management of changes in the European ePP environment. The ELLECTRA-WeB project gives an emphasis on interoperability by assuming it as the establishment of compatible specifications in both procedural and technical levels. On the procedural level, ELLECTRA-WeB is based on the IDABC guidelines, as the most appropriate interpretation of EC Directives, and, therefore, its solution will be interoperable with any other solution across Europe that adheres those directives. It follows the revolutionary approach of software engineering approach (MDE) that allows easy adoption of the ePP Application Framework to possible evolution of the IDABC interpretation of the EC Directives. On the technical level, ELLECTRA-WeB project follows the SOA approach that will ensure easy integration of the particular EC service into any other service relevant to ePP application. Based on that, the ePP solution generated by the project will be technically interoperable with any other EC compliant ePP solution. Technology choice: Open source software

Main results, benefits and impacts

The overall impact in the Western Balkan region may be identified as strategic, economic and social. The strategic impact will be direct and measurable, through the introduction of ready-to-use, tested and user-friendly electronic Public Procurement solutions in the public authorities of the region. The successful implementation of these initial solutions will certainly speed up the take-up of ePP solutions also in public organizations that are involved in public procurement processes. Additionally, the ELLECTRA-WeB project will cultivate the market for ePP solutions, through the development of successful showcases in the central procurement authorities of the region. As a result, an increase in competition within the ICT industry is expected, which will allow also smaller ICT developers to have the opportunity to participate in the development of ePP solutions. In particular, ELLECTRA-WeB will allow substantial cost saving in the development of ePP solutions and moreover, it will enable ICT developers to improve to their competitive advantage the ePP Application Framework. At the same time, the project will be a challenge for SMEs to adapt to the new environment and learn how to use the new ePP solutions. Thus, apart from being easy-to-use and require basic IT skills, the ePP solutions will have a positive impact on facilitating cross-border public procurement within the region and between the region and the EU. Finally, the eventual adoption of ePP solutions in the Western Balkan region will have a considerable positive impact on the general public. In particular, the public’s demand for a distribution of public funds (which burden the taxpayer) in a cost-effective and open manner is a major political issue across the region. Increased transparency and efficiency in the procurement process will significantly enhance citizens’ trust in Public Organizations. At the pan-European level, ELLECTRA-WeB will effectively contribute to the harmonization effort of the EU in the area of ePP, by developing an Application Framework for ePP solutions that is fully compliant with the EC legal framework on public procurement. It will contribute also to the facilitation of ePP in European Public Administrations and businesses in the immediate future by making available a vertical open-source ePP application development environment. In this context, starting from the Western Balkan region, the targeted geographic market for ELLECTRA-WeB, is the European public procurement market. The European market is characterized by a considerable potential size, having a dimension of more than 1500 billion Euro (for the EU-15 in 2002), which is approximately 16% of the EU’s Gross Domestic Product. According to estimates of the IDABC, “the widespread use of ePP is expected to bring about savings of some 5% a year by 2010”.

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Track record of sharing

The main two categories of the ELLECTRA-WeB project’s actors are the following: Public Procurement Authorities: within the scope of the project, the primary users of the ePP Application Framework will be the participating Public Authorities (among them 3 central public procurement agencies: PPA-BiH, PPB and PPO). Their interest lies in adapting the ELLECTRA-WeB results to their individual requirements in order to improve the performance and quality of procurement service delivery. The ELLECTRA-WeB technical partners will support the Public Authorities to take-up the developed ePP solutions upon completion of the project, provided that these solutions have been positively evaluated during the pilots. It should be noted that it is the intention of the ELLECTRA-WeB technical partners to provide the tailored ePP solutions as open-source solutions to the Public Authorities for an unlimited duration of time. In addition, supporting services if requested will be provided at a preferential rate. Technical & Research Partners: by developing the ELLECTRA-WeB ePP Application Framework these partners seek to validate and fine-tune their technical and research activities. Their individual use plans involves the identification of key areas of performance improvement in the ePP Application Framework in terms of extending its functionality (to keep up with emerging needs from the perspective of ICT providers as well as end-users) and enhancing the Application Framework with complementary infrastructures (e.g. semantic-web technology). In addition, within the scope of the project, technology and research partners will have the opportunity to test the provision of supporting services that are demanded by Public Organizations.

Lessons learnt

This section will be updated soon, as trials take place during the 2nd year of the project. Scope: International, National, Regional (sub-national)