EU Seeking 225 Translation Contractors for Six Target Languages

On November 6, 2018, the European Parliament’s Directorate General for Translation (DGT) issued two new invitations to tender for translation into six target languages: Croatian, German, Irish, Polish, Romanian and Spanish, divided into multiple lots.

The framework contracts for both tenders are expected to start on January 1, 2020 for a period of one year. The contracts will be reviewed annually and last a maximum of four years. The deadline for receipt of tenders is December 7, 2018. Contracts will be awarded based on quality and price.

The first tender is split into 12 lots and involves an estimated 99,300 pages, for which the Parliament envisages contracting a total of 195 participants. Translation is required into the six languages for monolingual source documents drafted in either English or French. The tender relates to documents for the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union, the European Court of Auditors, the European Economic and Social Committee, and the European Committee of the Regions.

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The second tender is divided into 6 lots and involves an estimated 12,800 pages, for which the Parliament envisages contracting a total of 30 participants. Translation is required into the six languages for documents drafted in German, Spanish or Italian (if monolingual) and in English, French, German, Spanish and Italian (if multilingual). The tender relates to documents for the European Parliament, the European Economic and Social Committee, and the European Committee of the Regions.

The tender specifications for both tenders say that “the Institutions are looking for highly qualified and experienced translation service providers who can deliver the best quality translations ready to use and delivered on time according to the requirements stipulated in these procurement documents.” In the question and answer forum, the European Parliament clarified that “only one named individual translator can be proposed by a tenderer for each lot.” Participants may bid for one or more lots.

The specifications also indicate that the documents for translation will vary in length and text type and that the workload may fluctuate over the year. Translation work will be offered out to all contractors and “assigned to the highest-ranked contractor” who confirms availability within the required three hour timeframe. Throughout the contract, contractors will be reassessed every three months to determine the order of ranking.

The specifications detail the situation for companies established in the UK, as the Brexit deadline of March 29, 2019 approaches. “Economic operators established in the United Kingdom are allowed to apply to this call and to submit tenders,” the tender specifications say. After the country’s departure from the European Union, however, the “rules of access to EU public procurement procedures of economic operators established in third countries” will also apply to UK companies unless the EU and the UK come to some other agreement “in their currently ongoing negotiations,” the document reads. But failing a special arrangement with the EU, UK companies will be excluded from the procurement procedures for these tenders.

On November 27, 2018, a third tender was issued on the European Institution’s TED portal, which involves translation services as part of European Training Foundation (ETF) Project Activities in Azerbaijan.

As part of the European Union funded project, the ETF is looking for three main types of services: organization of meetings, seminars and workshops in Azerbaijan; event-related services both in and outside of Azerbaijan; and support to ETF networking activities in Azerbaijan, including translation of project documents.

The contract will be awarded to one operator for a duration of two years with possible renewal, and a maximum value of EUR 225,000 (USD 255,400). The deadline for submitting tenders is January 15, 2019 and the project is expected to start in May 2019.

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