The court found no error by the Office for the Protection of Competition regarding the cancellation of the contract for the digitization of the building process

Prague - The Regional Court in Brno found no procedural errors on the part of the Office for the Protection of Competition (ÚOHS) when it annulled the ministry of regional development's (MMR) tender for the digitization of the building process. ÚOHS announced this on its website today. According to the court's decision, the company System Servis, which challenged the contract, was entitled to submit a proposal, despite MMR disputing this. MMR also set unclear conditions for software use and did not establish fixed deadlines, which complicated suppliers' assessment of their options. The court concluded that the ministry's failure to initiate the tender with sufficient advance notice demonstrated time pressure.

The court-affirmed decision concerns the open tender titled Ensuring Digitization of the Building Process, which MMR announced in March 2023. The firm System Servis, which submitted the complaint to ÚOHS, had several objections regarding the tender. This company was often referred to by former minister for regional development Ivan Bartoš (Pirates), who initiated the procurement for the systems, as a 'printer supplier' and pointed out that it did not even participate in the competition.

According to the court, however, it is a party with active procedural legitimacy to submit a motion to initiate proceedings, as it can be inferred at least its 'theoretical possibility of obtaining the public contract and participating in its fulfillment'. "The subject of the applicant's business corresponds in substance to the subject of the public contract. Moreover, the applicant is an established IT supplier with numerous references. The subjective view of the plaintiff, who does not consider the applicant to be a 'relevant supplier', is premature under these circumstances," stated ÚOHS.

Suppliers applying for the contract also, according to the court, lacked specific information necessary for its processing. For instance, MMR did not set specific delivery deadlines, making it unclear for companies how to meet the binding deadlines established by the schedule. Additionally, the ministry conditioned whether the software used by suppliers could be used for the contract. However, interested parties could only learn about this after the contract was signed. According to ÚOHS, this was a crucial criterion for suppliers. MMR then refused to remove this condition despite suppliers' objections.

The court also noted that the timelines outlined in the schedule are particularly short and clearly indicate the time pressure to which MMR subjected suppliers. According to ÚOHS, this was likely because it failed to initiate the tender process with sufficient advance notice. The initiation of the tender for the contract took place in the year 2023, even though MMR had been aware of the need to introduce a new information system at least since 2021. At that time, under Klára Dostálová (ANO), MMR awarded a contract for the implementation of the digitization systems for the building process. However, Bartoš canceled this and called for a new tender.

Some companies, due to the conditions in the contract, reportedly did not want to participate in the competition, according to ÚOHS and the court. The Office conducted a survey among 23 suppliers in the sector, and they confirmed this. The court then recognized this sample as 'sufficiently diverse'.

On Wednesday, the government will address the question of how to proceed with the digitization of the building process. Based on an analysis by Minister of Transport Martin Kupka (ODS), it should decide whether to continue developing the current system or to start from scratch, including launching a new tender for suppliers. Kupka is responsible for coordinating the digitization of the building process after Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS) proposed Bartoš's dismissal due to system problems. The Pirates then left the government over this issue.

In the analysis, Kupka is expected to present the pros and cons of both options for further action to the government. With the new Minister for Regional Development Petr Kulhánek (for STAN), he is also working on a legislative change allowing the simultaneous use of the original and the new building process system.

"The goal of the Pirates in opposition is to finalize digitization, not to start over and pass the problem to the next government. If the government were to throw everything in the trash, it would have to be effectively dealt with by the next government, and the digitization of the building process would not launch until at least 2028, which is unacceptable for us. Therefore, we advocate a so-called partial bypass, i.e., the possibility of using the new nationwide system temporarily alongside the existing systems. Thus, the building documentation would remain in digital form - instead of the complicated and slow transfer of a single copy of documentation among several authorities, there would be one shared file," stated Jakub Michálek, chair of the Pirates' parliamentary club, in a press release to ČTK this evening, who participated in the discussions with ministers Kupka and Kulhánek and representatives of parliamentary clubs on the topic.