November 19 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's competition regulator said that it has dismissed a complaint filed by local consortium GBS Sever over the ranking of offers submitted in a tender of state-owned Bulgartransgaz for construction of a main gas pipeline linking valve station (VS) Batultsi and VS Kalugerovo.
The offer of the consortium, comprising Glavbolgarstroy and Glavbolgarstroy International, has been ranked in accordance with the technical requirements set in the tender documentation, the Commission for Protection of Competition concluded in its decision, published on Friday.
In its complaint, GBS Sever disputed its mark on one of the technical criteria. However, the regulator's analysis showed that the offer did not meet part of the requirements and was rightly not awarded the maximum score. In addition, even if the company had received the maximum mark on this component, its overall score would have still be lower than the first-placed offer.
On September 27, Bulgartransgaz said it has decided to sign a contract for the supply, construction and commissioning of a main gas pipeline between VS Batultsi and VS Kalugerovo with Zapadgasenergoinvest consortium led by local Europroject Building.
GBS Sever's offer was ranked second, as it received lower marks both in terms of price and technical criteria. GBS Sever's bid was priced at 22 million levs ($12.9 million/11.2 million euro), while Zapadgasenergoinvest tie-up offered to build the pipeline for 21.9 million levs.
Europroject Building has a registered capital of 2 levs and is fully owned by private individual Yoana Litovska, commercial register data shows. The company's assets totalled 1.36 million levs at the end of 2017, of which 454,000 levs in cash deposits and 325,000 levs in receivables from clients.
Europroject Building generated total revenue of 2.2 million levs in 2017, up from 291,000 levs in 2016.
The other members of the Zapadgasenergoinvest consortium are Russia's Zapadgasenergoinvest and Sofia-based Climatronic.
According to the tender documents, Bulgartransgaz will provide no more than 30% of the value of the contract in advance.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)