---
title: "University of York - Transforming Online Education"
ocid: "ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e"
canonical_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e"
markdown_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e.md"
json_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e.json"
source: "Find A Tender Service"
current_stage: "Award"
buyer: "UNIVERSITY OF YORK"
published: "2026-07-23"
---

# University of York - Transforming Online Education

Buyer: UNIVERSITY OF YORK  
Current stage: Award  
OCID: ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e

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## Summary

The University of York has completed the procurement process for a strategic partner to transform its online education offering. The successful tenderer, Futurelearn Limited, was chosen to accelerate the growth and global reach of the University's online portfolio. This initiative, titled "Transforming Online Education," falls under the services category and involves advertising and marketing as well as higher education services. The contract was awarded through a selective procurement process, categorised as a competitive flexible procedure. Key dates include the award date on 16th July 2026, with the contract period beginning 10th August 2026 and potential to extend up to a maximum of 2041. Located in York, the procurement process embodied a significant milestone with the standstill period concluding on 4th August 2026.

This tender presents substantial opportunities for growth, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) like Futurelearn Limited, involved in educational services and digital marketing. The contract emphasizes innovative, data-driven marketing and student recruitment globally, requiring a partner with strong B2B sales capabilities and the ability to deliver a high-quality digital experience. It offers avenues for businesses offering marketing, recruitment, AI-driven programme development, and educational content creation, anticipating expansions like new online masters and short courses aligned with student and market demands. Companies with experience in these areas, particularly those adept at global outreach and digital transformation in education, would find this contract particularly lucrative.

## Notice

A high calibre, strategic partner to accelerate the growth and global reach of the University of York Online portfolio. With a mature and successful postgraduate online degree presence, the University plans to expand its current degree portfolio and develop new offerings in short courses, stackables and micro-credentials. Our needs include an OfS registered (or in the process of OfS registration), innovative partner with a proven track record of delivering high-impact, data-driven marketing, lead generation and student recruitment at a global level across a diverse portfolio of degrees, micro credentials and short courses. We require excellent market insight, conversion management, the delivery of a seamless, high quality digital experience for learner recruitment, as well as having capabilities in B2B sales and recruitment. The University of York will remain the lead for all current academic pedagogy, teaching, and for the long term student success and pastoral journey. Following an initial phase of transition for our existing online programmes, we will take forward new developments including but not necessarily limited to: New and/or revised online Masters degrees University- or partner-developed short courses, with credit-bearing options, that may provide pathways to degrees 'Stackable' short courses and awards Innovative use of AI to support programme development and delivery (content, assessment and feedback) and to enhance the student experience and progression.

### Lot Information

Lot 1

Options: The partner can increase the scale, number or type of courses to the provision. The scope is anticipated to commence with marketing and admissions services but is scoped to include the delivery of new full, part time and short courses and the provision of micro credentials.

Renewal: Where the services and commercial offer have evolved or remained similar in scale and or nature, where the requirement continues, where the performance of the services continues to meet our requirements, the University reserves the right to extend this agreement by either one or two consecutive periods of five years.

### Planning Information

Interested parties should register at our procurement portal - In-tend: https://in-tendhost.co.uk/york/aspx/Home
All information pertinent to this Preliminary Market Engagement will be communicated via the above mentioned portal. Please do not email us. Please use the link, register and follow the instructions on the portal.
Our non-disclosure agreement must be signed before sensitive information is shared. Instructions to receive the NDA , will be provided on In-tend. Your status as a bona fide potential service delivery partner with the minimum credentials must be verified before sensitive information is shared. 
Our consultation focuses upon our substantive draft of the procurement documentation for our imminent Invitation to Participate which will be published in March. We ask you to review our draft Outcomes-based Specification with relevant annexes, our draft legal Term Sheet and our draft Quantitative (price) Reply Form. Our intent is to understand from you what you feel is missing, ambiguous, surprising, unhelpful, valued, strategically aligned etc within the documentation so we can improve it for a better Partnership with you. 
We ask you to respond to our questionnaire which should be submitted via In-tend by 16:00hrs on Friday 20 February 2026.
We reserve the right to hold a 1-2-1 online meeting with a number of the respondents to the questionnaire to better understand their responses and or to explore some of the concepts they raise. Such online meetings would be held on 26 February or 2 March 2026. Please reserve these dates in your diary in case you are requested to attend.

## Key Details

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication source | Find A Tender Service |
| Latest notice | https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/069595-2026 |
| Notice type | UK6 - Contract Award Notice |
| Procurement type | Standard |
| Procurement category | Services |
| Procurement method | Selective |
| Procurement method details | Competitive flexible procedure |
| Tender suitability | SME |
| Awardee scale | SME |
| All stages | Planning, Tender, Award |

## Dates

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication date | 23 Jul 2026 |
| Submission deadline | Not specified |
| Future notice date | 16 Mar 2026 |
| Award date | 15 Jul 2026 |
| Contract period | 9 Aug 2026 - 9 Aug 2031 |
| Recurrence | Not specified |

## Values

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender value | £100 |
| Lots value | £100 |
| Awards value | £92,000,000 |
| Contracts value | Not specified |

## Status

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender status | Complete |
| Lots status | Complete |
| Awards status | Pending |
| Contracts status | Not specified |

## Buyer

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Main buyer | UNIVERSITY OF YORK |
| Locality | YORK |
| Post town | York |
| Postcode | YO10 5DD |
| Country | England |
| ITL 1 | TLE Yorkshire and The Humber |
| ITL 2 | TLE2 North Yorkshire |
| ITL 3 | TLE21 York |
| Local authority | York |
| Electoral ward | Hull Road |
| Westminster constituency | York Central |
| Delivery location | TLE21 York |

## Supplier

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Number of suppliers | 1 |
| Supplier names | FUTURELEARN |

## CPV Codes

### Divisions

- 79 - Business services: law, marketing, consulting, recruitment, printing and security
- 80 - Education and training services

### Codes

- 79340000 - Advertising and marketing services
- 80300000 - Higher education services

## Release History

- 23 Jul 2026 at 10:27 - Award - UK6 - Contract Award Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/069595-2026
- 17 Mar 2026 at 11:18 - Tender - UK4 - Tender Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/023942-2026
- 9 Feb 2026 at 12:02 - Planning - UK2 - Preliminary Market Engagement Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/011329-2026
- 20 Jan 2026 at 16:01 - Planning - UK3 - Planned Procurement Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/004967-2026

## Documents

- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/069595-2026
  23rd July 2026 - Contract award notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/023942-2026
  17th March 2026 - Tender notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/011329-2026
  9th February 2026 - Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender
- https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/004967-2026
  20th January 2026 - Planned procurement notice on Find a Tender

## Notice URLs

- http://www.york.ac.uk
- https://in-tendhost.co.uk/york/aspx/Home
- https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/54/contents

## Provenance

This Markdown file is an alternate public rendering of the D3 Tenders contract record. The canonical page is https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e. The underlying structured data is available as OCDS JSON at https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-060a4e.json.