Joint competitive tendering paid off – Istekki and owner customers achieved significant savings

Istekki tendered teleoperator services for itself and four of its owner customers. The procurement ring brought significant benefits to competitive tendering: the workload of individual organisations was reduced, and the price level achieved due to the large total volume was significantly below expectations.

Istekki’s previous competitive tendering for teleoperator services had already been a while ago, and both the market and needs had changed. The owner customers also needed to tender their own contracts. Istekki, Pirkanmaa wellbeing services county, North Savo wellbeing services county, North Savo Regional Council and the Islab wellbeing services consortium formed a procurement ring, which started tendering approximately 40,000 subscriptions using Hansel’s dynamic procurement system (DPS) for teleoperator services.

“We wanted a contract that would meet the current and future needs of both us and our customers. “In a tight financial situation, we naturally pursued savings, and to our delight, we were able to achieve them,” procurement specialist Laura Heinänen says.

As a technology company, Istekki had strong expertise in defining the object of the procurement. The experts of Istekki’s Communications Technology team also played a key role in the market dialogue, which was conducted carefully with the companies before the actual competitive tendering.

“The long dialogue paid off. Our request for tenders was successful, we received a good number of bids, and there were no complaints or appeals,” rejoices Istekki’s category manager Tuija Sinkkonen.

Hansel’s support made procurement easier

The procurement ring of five contracting entities made competitive tendering more efficient, but the involvement of several parties also complicated the procurement process. Istekki used Hansel’s MinikisaPlus service, so Heinänen, who was in charge of coordinating the competitive tendering, got support from Hansel’s experts.

“We received a lot of support from lawyer Pekka Kääriäinen and procurement specialist Leo Ahtilinna as we were considering the best practices for various situations. They are familiar with market practices and what is possible under the terms of DPS. DPS’s ready-made requirements and templates saved us a lot of working time,” Heinänen says.

Joint procurement frees up resources for core activities

Istekki makes extensive use of Hansel’s joint procurement, especially in so-called basic procurements, where large volumes provide clear benefits.

“For example, we use joint procurement of travel and office supplies. Through joint procurement, we can save our own resources for competitions where we want to use our own special expertise,” says Sinkkonen.

Overall, Istekki is very satisfied with the tendering of teleoperator services and its outcome.

“The tendering of teleoperator services showed well that centralised procurement can generate significant savings. Combining the volumes and expert preparation between the Communications Technology team and stakeholders facilitated a package that supports the organisations’ current and future technology needs in a cost-efficient manner. “None of the organisations involved in the procurement ring would have been able to achieve such savings on their own,” Istekki’s Tuija Sinkkonen and the business manager of the Communications Technology team Veli-Pekka Leppänen comment.

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