Procurement for Education Technology Managed Services

Notice Title

Procurement for Education Technology Managed Services

Notice Description

The Education Authority (EA) has a requirement to procure a Supplier to provide Education Technology Managed Services (ETMS). The EA is responsible for ensuring that efficient and effective primary and secondary education services are available to meet the needs of children and young people and support the provision of efficient and effective youth services. As part of this, EA manages an educational technology service for over 1,100 schools, 350,000 pupils, 22,000 teachers and 40,000 non-teaching staff. The ETMS will replace and transform the technical infrastructure and services for schools known as the Education Network for Northern Ireland (ENNI), providing digital services to schools to support teaching and learning. End users of the ETMS are from primary, post primary, special schools, Education Other than at School (EOTAS) centres and nursery schools (staff only) who all require access to secure and efficient technology infrastructure to support their teaching and learning needs. This includes Controlled Schools, Controlled Integrated Schools, Catholic Maintained Schools, Irish Medium Schools, Grant Maintained Integrated Schools, Controlled and Voluntary Grammar Schools and users from approved education and external stakeholder organisations as further described in the ETMS Technical Specification - PSQ Stage. The EA is procuring the ETMS as a single integrated ETMS Contract, comprising: * Infrastructure and Network Services (including Integration Services); * Identity Services; * Security Operations Centre Services; * User Experience Services; and * Service Management and Service Desk, including Schools Catalogue. The procurement is being conducted using the Competitive Flexible Procedure, as further described in this notice and in the procurement documents. The procurement strategy has been informed by preliminary market engagement, which commenced with EA publishing a UK2: Preliminary market engagement notice on 18th December 2025 in Find a Tender Service (FTS) (Notice identifier: 2025/S 000-084518/ Procurement identifier (OCID): ocds-h6vhtk-05f966. (Provision for Education Technology Managed Services - Find a Tender) Further details are provided in the procurement documents. The ETMS Contract will be for an initial term that commences on the Effective Date (as defined in the Contract) and ends on 31st March 2035, which is seven years from the planned transition completion date of 31st March 2028. The Contract will also include up to seven extension periods of one year each which may be awarded individually or as multiple years at the EA's sole discretion (resulting in a latest contract expiry date of 31st March 2042). The value of the ETMS Contract over its maximum term (i.e. initial term plus extensions) is currently estimated to be circa PS851m including allowances for changes / modifications, indexation (i.e. inflation) and VAT in accordance with the Procurement Act 2023. This comprises circa PS246m for core services paid for by EA over the initial term of the contract (including contingency/OB, inflation and VAT), and a further circa PS605m for contract extensions, schools catalogue and potential Optional Services or Additional Services (including contingency/OB, inflation and VAT). Under this procurement the successful Supplier will be required to support EA's social value objectives. Accordingly, contract performance conditions and award criteria will relate, in particular, to social value. Further details are provided below and in the procurement documents. Suppliers should note that this Competition has commenced whilst the business case process is ongoing. The EA is currently working with the Department of Education to secure business case approval prior to the commencement of the Tender Stage. Progression of the Competition to the Tender Stage and Award Stage will be subject to the necessary approvals being in place.

Lot Information

Lot 1

Options: EA intends to include Optional Services and Additional Services in the ETMS Contract, which can be explained as follows: * Optional Services are services directly related to the ETMS project for which EA's future requirements can be specified in reasonable detail and with reasonable certainty at the time of this procurement, enabling these services to be clearly specified in the ETMS Contract and allowing Suppliers to tender a price (i.e. an optional price) for the provision of such services at a future point in the ETMS Contract if called upon by the Authority at that time. Optional Services are provided for in the Cabinet Office Model Services Contract. * Additional Services are services which are reasonably foreseeable and can be described at a high level in the contract, however EA's future requirements cannot be specified in reasonable detail and with reasonable certainty at the time of this procurement, and accordingly at the time of this procurement Suppliers could not provide a price for the provision of such services at a future point in the ETMS Contract. Future provision of such Additional Services would be subject to a contract modification in accordance with the PA 2023. EA intends to include the following Optional Services and Additional Services in the ETMS Contract. Further details are provided in the procurement documents. Optional Services * Provision (if not otherwise provided by EA), implementation and management of LAN network switches. * Provision (if not otherwise provided by EA), implementation and management of end user devices. Additional Services * WAN router managed service for schools following the end of the current PSSN Contract. * Provision and installation of wireless access points across all school sites and EA corporate sites to meet agreed coverage and capacity targets. It will be for EA to decide, at is sole discretion, whether to proceed with any of the above Optional Services or Additional Services. Such decisions will be based on business case assessments of available options for addressing the requirement at the relevant time, taking account of value for money, risk and other business considerations. The EA will have the right at all times to procure the Optional Services and Additional Services separately including (without limitation) by way of a separate procurement exercise.

Renewal: The Contract will include up to seven extension periods of one year each which may be awarded individually or as multiple years at the EA's sole discretion (resulting in a latest contract expiry date of 31st March 2042).

Planning Information

Suppliers who wish to participate in the PME exercise must return the completed questionnaire via the messaging function of the CfT on eTendersNI no later than 3pm on Friday 30th January 2026. EA reserves the right to seek additional clarification information in relation to any responses provided by suppliers as part of this exercise. Such clarifications would be limited to those questionnaire responses that require clarification. In addition, EA may invite all suppliers who have expressed an interest in the infrastructure managed services contract (i.e. in response to Question 2.1), to attend an individual PME meeting. The focus of such meetings will be to further clarify (where necessary) each supplier’s responses to the PME Questionnaire where such responses relate to the procurement strategy for the infrastructure managed services contract (as this would be the first procurement to follow the PME exercise if the Education Technology Managed Services were to be procured as separate contracts). Such meetings shall take place via MS Teams and are expected to take place between 2nd and 27th February 2026. Suppliers should note that EA is required by the Procurement Act 2023 to keep a record of the information it has shared and received as part of the preliminary market engagement, including information shared and received in such meetings. Accordingly, EA is required to keep a record of the meeting discussions and may be required to share details of such meetings with all suppliers at the commencement of any tender process. EA may be required by the Act to share such information on a non-attributable basis and in such circumstances would exclude any confidential information or commercially sensitive information of the supplier to the extent permitted by the Act. For the avoidance of doubt, this is the scoping phase of the project and is not part of a formal procurement process. Further information including the questionnaire can be downloaded from eTendersNI CfT Documents area of CfT 6316535.

Publication & Lifecycle

Open Contracting ID

ocds-h6vhtk-05f966

Publication Source

Find A Tender Service

Latest Notice

https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/061969-2026

Current Stage

Tender

All Stages

Planning, Tender

Procurement Classification

Notice Type

UK4 - Tender Notice

Procurement Type

Standard

Procurement Category

Services

Procurement Method

Selective

Procurement Method Details

Competitive flexible procedure

Tender Suitability

Not specified

Awardee Scale

Not specified

Common Procurement Vocabulary (CPV)

CPV Divisions

48 - Software package and information systems

72 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support

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CPV Codes

48200000 - Networking, Internet and intranet software package

48600000 - Database and operating software package

48800000 - Information systems and servers

72000000 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support

72200000 - Software programming and consultancy services

72500000 - Computer-related services

72700000 - Computer network services

Notice Value(s)

Tender Value

£709,000,000 £100M-£1B

Lots Value

£709,000,000 £100M-£1B

Awards Value

Not specified

Contracts Value

Not specified

Notice Dates

Publication Date

1 Jul 20261 months ago

Submission Deadline

1 Jul 2026Expired

Future Notice Date

30 Jan 2026Expired

Award Date

Not specified

Contract Period

30 Sep 2027 - 31 Mar 2035 Over 5 years

Recurrence

Not specified

Notice Status

Tender Status

Active

Lots Status

Active

Awards Status

Not Specified

Contracts Status

Not Specified

Contracting Authority (Buyer)

Main Buyer

the Education Authority

Additional Buyers

Education Authority

Contact Name

Available with D3 Tenders Premium →

Contact Email

Available with D3 Tenders Premium →

Contact Phone

Available with D3 Tenders Premium →

Buyer Location

Locality

BELFAST

Postcode

BT1 2NQ

Postcode Area

Northern Ireland

Country

Northern Ireland

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Major Region (ITL 1)

TLN Northern Ireland

Basic Region (ITL 2)

TLN0 Northern Ireland

Small Region (ITL 3)

TLN06 Belfast

Delivery Location

Not specified

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Local Authority

Belfast

Electoral Ward

Duncairn

Westminster Constituency

Belfast North

Notice Documents

• https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/061969-2026
  1st July 2026 - Tender notice on Find a Tender
• https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/053968-2026
  8th June 2026 - Tender notice on Find a Tender
• https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/084518-2025
  18th December 2025 - Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender
• https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/084494-2025
  18th December 2025 - Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender

Notice URLs

• https://etendersni.gov.uk/epps/getHomeDashboard.do
• https://etendersni.gov.uk/epps/getHomeDashboard.do Under no circumstances will EA or its advisors be liable for any costs or expenses incurred by economic operators, their funders and/or their respective advisors arising directly or indirectly from the procurement process, their participation in or termination thereof, including, without limitation, preparation and submission of responses, as a result of any changes or adjustments made to the procurement documents or the exclusion/disqualification of an economic operator. Only the express terms of the contractual documents, if and when executed shall have any contractual effect in connection with the matters to which this procurement process relates. Neither the issue of the procurement documents, nor any of the information presented in them, should be regarded as a commitment or representation on the part of EA (or any other person) to enter into a contractual arrangement. Nothing in the procurement documents should be interpreted as a commitment by EA to award a contract to an economic operator as a result of this procurement process, nor to accept the lowest price or any tender. No legally binding contract shall arise (and a tenderer shall have no legitimate expectation that a contract will be entered into) until such time as entry into the contract has been confirmed by EA. As such, EA reserves the right at any time to cancel, withdraw or amend the procurement process at any stage. Continued from; Competitive flexible procedure description * [FRM03.N21] In accordance with section 24 of the PA 2023, the EA reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to further refine the above Award Criteria and/or weightings in the ITPD that is issued to the shortlisted Suppliers at the Pre-Initial Tender Dialogue Stage and/or in the Invitation to Submit Initial Tender (ISIT) that is issued to the shortlisted Suppliers at the Initial Tender Stage. Examples of how the Authority might wish to refine the Award Criteria and/or weightings include; (a) adding new sub-criteria to those criteria set out in the tender notice/associated procurement documents, with a proportionate reallocation of sub-criteria weightings; (b) adding more detail to existing criteria set out in tender notice/associated procurement documents; (c) adding more detail to existing sub-criteria set out in the tender notice/associated procurement documents; and/or (d) changing the weightings of existing primary, secondary or tertiary criteria within a range of not more than +/- 5% of the current weighting in circumstances where there are no new criteria being added (for example, if a current weighting is 15%, the new weighting could not be less than 10% and not more than 20%). Suppliers should note that the EA reserves the right to amend or adjust the stages of this Competitive Flexible Procedure at any time at its discretion, including but not limited to in the ITPD that is issued to the shortlisted Suppliers at the Pre-Initial Tender Dialogue Stage, in accordance with the PA 2023 and the PR 2024. Suppliers should note that the EA wishes to conduct an efficient, effective and streamlined Competitive Flexible Procedure and does not wish to engage in any unnecessary dialogue which imposes costs on all parties and causes delay. Accordingly, it is envisaged that certain limits will be placed on the extent of dialogue that will be permitted. Further information on how the Initial Tender Stage and Final Tender Stage (as applicable) will be structured will be set out in the Invitation to Participate in Dialogue (ITPD) that is issued to the shortlisted Suppliers at the Pre-Initial Tender Dialogue Stage.
• https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/54/contents