New Technical Support Framework announced

Following a rigorous procurement process, we have appointed six nuclear supply chain organisations to our new Technical Support Framework (TSF)

The new TSF, which came in to effect on 1 November 2018, has been established to provide a renewed and modernised framework for procuring technical support which we use to obtain, for example, expert technical assessments, access to specialist software or modelling, or access to niche skill sets which are not retained within ONR. The framework gives us a continued supply of expert supply chain resources at competitive rates, with greater flexibility and efficiency in the call-off of work from suppliers.

ONR will benefit from the two tier framework by securing appropriate technical support in an increasingly competitive market, having the ability to initiate lower-value work more quickly which reduces the risk of TSCs not being available when required, and - in the case of ‘Lot 2’ of our Framework – being able to access capability from across the wider nuclear supply chain through our ‘Tier 1’ TSF suppliers.

The project has taken around 18 months, with the public procurement the main focus of the past nine months, and as part of the assessment of technical capability, the evaluation included an assessment of suppliers’ behaviours and an alignment with aspects of our own Behaviour Framework.

The existing TSF of 28 suppliers expired on 31 October 2018,  and the new model will be in place for four years in line with Public Procurement Regulations.

The new Tier 1 suppliers are split across two ‘Lots’: