AWE: Provision of scientific, manufacturing and research equipment, goods, and associated services

The Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) is an arms-length body of the Ministry of Defence employing around 6,000 people headquartered in Aldermaston, Berkshire.

For more than 70 years, AWE has supported the UK Government’s nuclear defence strategy and the Continuous At Sea Deterrent. We also use our nuclear know-how and technical expertise to provide innovative solutions that support the UK’s counter-terrorism & nuclear threat reduction activities.

AWE is looking to engage with the market to understand the supplier’s capability to support its world class scientific, manufacturing, and research requirements, in order to inform the procurement strategy for these requirements.

The scope of Services being considered is not limited to, but represented by:

Market / product research services

Sourcing / procurement services

Delivery services

Installation & commissioning services

Planned maintenance services

Unplanned rapid call out maintenance services

The largest and most complex of these areas is sourcing / procurement services for technical and scientific equipment for research and manufacturing where we are looking to understand the opportunities to form a single or a small number of strategic partnerships where suppliers are able to source, or sub-contract the broad range of equipment AWE requires. The bidder will also be required to provide through life support to the assets: installation & commissioning, and through-life maintenance.

The types of equipment we require support for is not limited to, but represented by:

Scientific & manufacturing equipment

Laboratory consumables

Chemicals & chemical compounds

Lasers

Lenses & optics

High vacuum equipment

X-ray generating equipment

Electronic components

Radioactive sources

Analytical standards

Packaging

Photographic & AV equipment

To support the development of our procurement strategy and understand how the market can support and fulfil AWE requirements, AWE is requesting interested parties to submit the proforma; Appendix A, to AWEProcurement@awe.co.uk, including in the title of your email submission “Lab Equipment & Consumables”.

Once the necessary security checks have been carried out using information submitted in the proforma, if successful, the RFI will be sent to the nominated email in your proforma.

Responses to the RFI should be submitted via email to AWEProcurement@awe.co.uk, including in the title of your email submission “Lab Equipment & Consumables”.

AWE is especially interested in tail-spend managers, scientific equipment and consumable resellers, and other entities that have experience providing or sourcing scientific equipment and consumables for businesses responding to this RFI.

The nature of this PIN is such that AWE intends to operate restrictions within the relevant procurement regulations in order to protect essential national security interests. If an economic operator has connections with any hostile entity or foreign states which are deemed by AWE to pose a risk to the UK’s national security interests or is otherwise considered not to possess the reliability necessary to exclude risks to the security of the United Kingdom, AWE reserves its right to exclude them from this exercise.

In issuing this PIN and engaging with the market, the AWE is not committing to conduct any procurement in relation to this Programme. Equally non-participation in this Market Engagement will not be taken into account in any future procurement activities and will not preclude any organisation from submitting a tender in any future competitions.

Note: The nature of this contract is such that the award will be subject to supplier’s passing AWE’s security requirements as dictated by its site licenses.

To access the Proforma, interested parties are advised to consult the Contracts Finder Notice using the link provided below - www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/9fbf1dd1-8d07… ↗