NNDKP Successful in a Major Public Procurement Dispute

February, 2017 - Bucharest, Romania

The public procurement procedure for the extension of Glina Waste Water Treatment Plant and the construction of a sludge incinerator has come to an end.

NNDKP has successfully represented the joint venture formed of three Spanish and French companies in the dispute regarding the award of the public procurement contract related to the “Extension of the Glina Waste Water Treatment Plant and the Construction of a Sludge Incinerator”, the public procurement procedure being organized by Bucharest Municipality.

The dispute lasted for a period of 3 years and entailed 4 evaluation and complaint filing stages. NNDKP filed three complaints whereby it argued and successfully proved that the bid that was initially ranked first breached the award documentation. As a result of the admission of these complaints by the competent courts, the bidder who had been initially designated as winning bidder was downgraded, and the contract was awarded to the consortium represented by NNDKP. The downgraded bidder has also filed a complaint against the new result of the procedure as well as a claim for the review of the decision rendered by the Bucharest Court of Appeals that had confirmed the sanction of downgrading its bid. Nevertheless, NNDKP has succeeded in successfully defending its clients’ interests against these actions.

In accordance with the legal provisions, the consortium represented by NNDKP has now the right to sign the public procurement contract with Bucharest Municipality, in the amount of RON 505,695,000.00, and to start the construction works.

The NNDKP team involved in this dispute was coordinated by Adina Chilim-Dumitriu, Partner and Head of the Public Procurement and PPP practice and Radu Damaschin, Partner within the Dispute Resolution practice. The team included associates Alexandru Aman, Cristian Dranca and Alexandra Enache.

”During the almost three years of work, we followed the strategy designed by our team together with the client, while remaining fully confident that we will reach our planned destination. NNDKP has the necessary resources to provide clients with diversified and integrated services, at the highest quality standards. The efforts made by our multidisciplinary team prove once again the necessity of having complementary services across the legal spectrum (to include both legal advice as well as assistance and representation in litigation) and emphasize the synergy existing at the level of NNDKP between our departments, aspects which, in the long run, are beneficial to our clients.”, stated Adina Chilim-Dumitriu, Partner.

”We are extremely happy with the outcome of this project. This has been a long-term group effort that was strongly sustained by all the parties involved. In the end, we are all pleased that the NNDKP team succeeded in asserting its arguments in this case. It is clear that all this work would not have been possible without the dedicated involvement of our colleagues from the public procurement and dispute resolution departments, and I hereby wholeheartedly thank them”, Radu Damaschin, Partner, added.

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