The tender for the management of the guarantee fund for SMEs risks distorting competition. This is supported by the Antitrust, which underlines how the minimum technical and economic-financial requirements required by the text exclude some suppliers potentially able to offer the service from the tender. "A correct tender procedure - reads the Authority's weekly bulletin - must allow for the widest possible participation of subjects interested in the selection process who have the appropriate technical and economic-financial requirements to provide the requested services".
In particular, the Antitrust refers to a passage of the tender which requests the participants "an experience referring to the last five years in the management of public aid measures for companies on behalf of public administrations, for a volume of grants granted not less than 500 million euros". Companies that are unable to certify this turnover in the last five years cannot provide other documents to demonstrate their economic and financial capacity. And they remain excluded.
In order to participate in the tender, a net worth of not less than 200 million euros is required. Even this point, according to the Authority, "might not be fully justified", above all "in the light of the extent of the service to be performed". The Antitrust therefore asks that "the criteria for admission to tenders" be reviewed and "do not include excessively onerous technical-economic requirements".
