High Growth Services Specialist Business Support Framework

The purpose of this ITT is to enable Scottish Enterprise (SE) to appoint suppliers to a multi Lot framework of specialists to provide commercialisation advisory and educational training support to select Scottish university pre- and post-spinout projects and other Scottish-based early-stage start-up companies within SE’s High Growth Company Support (HGCS) service.

The framework will be delivered via two services, Specialist Business Support and an Executive Education Programme, and is structured around four separate Lots.

The framework is expected to be in place for 2 years with the option to extend for a further 12 months if required.

Suppliers appointed to the Specialist Business Support part of the framework (Lots 1 – 3) must have lived entrepreneurial experience, role model credibility and a range of commercial and sectoral expertise that can deliver transformational value at critical points in an academic project’s progress to company creation or an early-stage start-up’s evolution towards scalable growth.

The Lot 2 supplier will have specific experience of working in several critical technologies areas (a term used by the UK Government), including: photonics, quantum, sensing, connectivity, and semiconductors. Related to these areas are several overlapping enabling technologies, including health diagnostics, space, climate tech, cyber-security and defence, and fintech.

One supplier will be appointed to this lot. Economic operators may be excluded from this competition if they are in any of the situations referred to in Regulation 58 of the Public Contracts (Scotland) Regulations 2015.

This is a relevant climate change contract, bidders are required to complete and return the attached Climate Change Plan template.

SPD Statement for 2A.17 – Form of Participation (Notably as part of a group, consortium, joint venture or similar).

Any contract will be entered into with the nominated lead organisation and all members of the consortium, who will in these circumstances each be required to execute said contract together with all ancillary documentation, evidencing their joint and several liability in respect of the obligations and liabilities of the contract. It will be for members of the consortium to sort out their respective duties and liabilities amongst each other. For administrative purposes, any associated documentation will be sent to the nominated lead organisation.

SPD Statement for 2C.1 - Where the main bidder relies on the capacities of other entities in order to meet the selection criteria, the bidder must provide a separate SPD response setting out the information required under SPD (Scotland): Part II (sections A and B); Part III exclusion grounds; the relevant part of Section IV selection criteria; and Part V (if applicable) for each of the entities concerned.

SPD Statement for 2D.1.2 – If the bidder proposes to subcontract any part(s) of the service and those sub-contractors are not relied upon, they should arrange for a separate SPD response from each potential subcontractor. The subcontractors must complete the relevant parts of the SPD (Scotland) (Sections A and B of Part II and Part III only) to self-declare whether there are grounds for their exclusion. [This may be requested at the selection stage or prior to the subcontractor commencing work on the contract.]