Before you start

Selling digital products and services to government means you’ll need to follow some rules. You’ll also need to understand how the Australian Government buys products and services.

Government departments and agencies usually buy digital products and services through open approaches to market or through our panels and arrangements.

How they choose to buy those products and services is based on the Commonwealth procurement rules and their agency’s requirements.

Searching for opportunities

Opportunities to sell to the Australian Government are published on AusTender. Government agencies also publish their annual procurement plans.

Register your business through AusTender to stay up to date. You can then follow the progress of planned procurements by adding proposals to your watch list.

You should also register with the Digital Marketplace if you’re selling digital services. You’ll find a list of available opportunities there.

Applying for opportunities

The way you apply to sell to government depends on what you’re selling.

If you’re selling digital services you can apply for opportunities on the Digital Marketplace. You’ll need to register and ask for an assessment. Once this has taken place you can apply for open opportunities.

If you’re selling computer hardware, cloud services or phone and internet services you may need to join a panel.

Joining a panel or arrangement

A panel is a group of suppliers that we’ve evaluated as being able to sell groups of products and services to government departments and agencies.

If you want to sell products and services covered by one of our panels you’ll need to join that panel.

Our current ICT panels cover:

• computer hardware
• commercial off the shelf (COTS) software
• telecommunications services
• mobile phones and phone plans
• data centre space and services
• cloud-based services

A volume sourcing arrangement is an agreement with a single supplier. Our current volume sourcing arrangements cover:

• IBM products and services
• Microsoft products and services
• SAP and Concur products and services

To join a panel you’ll need to apply when we’re setting up or updating the panel. When this happens we invite all potential sellers to make a submission — this is called an approach to market. We advertise these opportunities on AusTender.

The panel submission process:

1. You’ll need to show how you meet the panel’s requirements.
2. We’ll evaluate your submission against the selection criteria.
3. We’ll let you know whether or not your submission is successful.

If your submission is successful you must sign an agreement with the Commonwealth of Australia (represented by us) and be able to respond to quote requests by government agencies.

We’ll offer you feedback if your submission is unsuccessful.

Winning business

To do business with the government you’ll need to show you offer value for money.

The Department of Finance provides general advice about doing business with the Australian Government.

Procurement rules

Australian Government departments and agencies follow the Commonwealth Procurement Rules when buying products and services. The basic principle of government procurement is value for money.

It’s useful to understand how agencies buy digital products and services before becoming a seller.

Stay updated

You can follow our updates as well as AusTender to get notifications about new panels and updates of existing panels.

We’ll also ask for your feedback from time to time.