Germany’s Friedrich Vorwerk, one of Europe’s largest pipeline builders, has asked the Public Procurement Office to investigate actions taken by Klaipėdos Nafta (Klaipėda Oil) in handling the tender and take appropriate measures, including the suspension of tender procedures, according to the documents made available to BNS.
Friedrich Vorwerk was interested in the tender, which was issued last July, but later decided against bidding for the contract since the initial tender documentation stipulated that the bids would be assessed in terms of the price and the term of contract execution, the documents read.
However, Klaipėdos Nafta decided to modify the assessment criteria during the last stage of the tender and to only use the lowest price criterion when assessing the bids, which in Friedrich Vorwerk’s view, breached the fundamental EU’s procurement principles and Lithuania’s legislation explicitly.
Friedrich Vorwerk says that it is one of Europe’s largest companies specializing in the construction of underground piping, pipelines and plants, wastewater engineering, cable line construction, etc.
Germany’s PPS Pipeline Systems, which took part in the tender, said last week that it suspected that the tender had possibly breached the Public Procurement Law. According to media reports, the Germans plan to contest the results of the tender in the Klaipėda Regional Court.
PPS Pipeline Systems offered to build the link for 192.182 million litas (EUR 55.7m).
A consortium of two Lithuanian companies, Kauno Dujotiekio Statyba (Kaunas Pipeline Construction) and Šiaulių Dujotiekio Statyba (Šiauliai Pipeline Construction), which bid 166.979 million litas, including VAT, has been named the winner of the tender.
