America’s Business Contenders Who’s Next?

The Single Market began when the EU and the world were less complicated and entwined and many of the main players of today had not yet been known. When the EU was still known as the European Communities, Jacques Delors first proposed the European Single Market in 1985. Members States numbered significantly less than they do today. Germany was split in half while the Soviet Union stayed whole. With China and India accounting for less than 5% of the global GDP, the BRICS moniker was rare. Europe, on par with the USA, was a key actor in the world economy during that period. It led front stage in terms of economic weight and creative potential, therefore fostering a rich environment for growth and improvement.

Established with the intention of enhancing European integration

lowering economic barriers, allowing fair competition, and strengthening member state cooperation and solidarity, the  Public procurement, accounting for a sizable portion of the EU's GDP, is a powerful tool to drive innovation among European start-ups and scale-ups, but in spite of many repeated attempts its potential remains largely unutilized. An alternative action that could be taken is the launch of a standing online matchmaking platform for possible joint procurements of the 27 EU Member States. As already noted, we should make sure that we build a public-private partnership culture. It implies to overcome a certain bias against PPPs from a fiscal standpoint and requires, for example, the adoption of tools such concessions and licenses and the strengthening of regulatory frameworks to ensure a balance between affordability for taxpayers and profitability for investors. To untap the potential of innovation procurement, on top of enlarging the importance of other award criteria beyond price, public buyers should be directed towards requiring products that are based on common standards and are interoperable. Moreover, it is to be avoided in the Single Market that individual Member States goldplate European procurement rules. Due consideration should be awarded to the option of transforming the EU procurement framework into a Regulation, thus limiting the discretion for national fragmentation. Digital tendering should be applied by default, on the basis of standard and digitally verifiable credentials, a possibility now opened by the EU Wallet. 

This will facilitate access to public tenders to players of different sizes across the European Union. 

The Commission shall also consider setting a minimum quota of innovation procurement that Member States should implement. Lastly, in order to facilitate regulatory compliance with procurement rules, Member States should consider establishing dedicated innovation procurement sandboxes, through which tenderers can be supported to better comply with procurement criteria.  Strengthening their capacity to deliver on EU goals, implement EU legislation and effectively manage EU money is another crucial aspect to improve the Single Market itself. Public administrations are the vector for channelling majority of EU funding to citizens and enterprises. Therefore, inadequate public administrations can operate as obstacles for the efficient implementation of projects meant to increase cross-border activity, scale SMRs, and, eventually, equip EU enterprises to take advantage of the Single Market and therefore engage in global competition. By means of the Technical Support Instrument (TSI), the Commission provides Member States with tailored-made expertise to support the reform and modernization of public administrations at national, regional, and local levels. This support helps strengthen their expertise and capacity, so enabling them to take ownership of implementing EU legislation and EU priorities, so benefiting the Single Market. Member States alone struggle to reform and strengthen their public administrations. Positive EU actions are needed to improve Member States' administrative capacity.

Moreover, public procurement has to be used to promote a "high road" to development

that is, policies and practices aiming for more than just the minimum standards in terms of wages and working conditions—that will help to match public expenditure with a larger agenda of social advancement and economic inclusiveness .Reliance on the lowest price award criterion as the default approach in public procurement warrants critical examination. While seemingly cost-effective, this practice often undermines the true potential of public spending - for example when it comes to delivering secure and safe products for the public benefit – and more generally the potential to create European added value. Over relying on the cheapest bid can lead to sacrifices in quality, sustainability, innovation, and social value. Ultimately, this can result in suboptimal services, long-term inefficiencies, and a failure to address broader societal and environmental goals, such as the maintenance of local ecosystems and critical supply chains in Europe. A shift in mindset is necessary, moving away from the lowest price as the sole determinant to a more holistic value-for-money approach, where factors such as quality, life-cycle costs, and broader social and environmental benefits are given equal consideration. For comparison, the European Commission, as a rule, uses a weighted average of 70% for quality (which may include all aspects mentioned above) and 30% for the cost. Moreover, in the public tender for European supercomputers, the General Court of the EU has confirmed that EU added value and security of supply are legitimate additional criteria.