Loading contract…
BETAThis is a new independent transparency project, not an official government website. The data is sourced from public registers and may contain errors, so always verify against the official source. If you find a problem, please report it here.
The purpose of this Preliminary Market Engagement Notice is to inform the market that UKRI will soon be tendering the Supercomputing hardware for the Next National Supercomputing Service based at the University of Edinburgh and to also arrange pre-market engagement meetings with vendors attending SC25.
The UK Compute Roadmap (July 2025) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-compute-roadmap/uk-compute-roadmap sets out the vision for "a world-class compute ecosystem that provides a platform for innovation, growth and opportunity across the economy." This includes the investment of "up to £750 million for a new national supercomputer service in Edinburgh" as announced by government at the June 2025 spending review. The Next National Supercomputing Service (NNSS) will provide a compute infrastructure for the UK's research and innovation communities to utilise cutting-edge modelling, simulation and AI workflows: a key component of the UK government's ambition. The current estimated budget for the Supercomputing System is in the range of £300m - £330m(including VAT).
The supercomputer will be an owned asset of UKRI with the hosting service provision responsibilities undertaken by Edinburgh Parallel Computing Centre (wholly owned by Edinburgh University).
The applicability of the Social Value Act (SVA), tackling wider social, economic, and environmental benefits is considered for procurements, and as such, vendors will be expected to comply with UKRI's Responsible Procurement Charter (https://www.ukri.org/publications/responsible-procurement-charter/).
UKRI intends to conduct pre-market engagement events during November 2025.
UKRI's market engagement plan will comprise of the following steps, which are intending to run sequentially with vendors participating in each step as applicable:
Step 1 - Respond to this Notice
UKRI would like to hear from the following vendors:
Please email …@ukri.org to express an interest in this requirement.
Step 2 - Arranging meetings at SC25 and the Market Engagement Questionnaire
UKRI will arrange meetings at SC25 with relevant suppliers and we will also issue a market engagement questionnaire to these suppliers w/c 20th October 2025.
Step 3 - In-Person Engagement (SC25 Nov 16-21, 2025 - St Louis)
UKRI wishes to arrange face to face pre-market engagement meetings with vendors that are in attendance at SC25 during Nov 17-20, 2025 at St. Louis. UKRI, DSIT and the Supercomputer Procurement Group members will be present at the meetings. Please email to …@ukri.org using the following title 'UKRI-5244 - SC25 In-person Engagement' to register your interest and provide available meeting options between the 17th -19th November. The duration of these meetings would be up to 2 hours at UKRI's discretion.
Please note that the date relating to the publication of the contract notice is tentative and is subject to approval of the Business Case by the relevant UK Government departments (including Department for Science Innovation and Technology and HM Treasury) All future tender documentation will be made available via UKRI's e-sourcing portal and potential bidders should register on this portal to ensure they have access to all tender documentation when the tender is published.
No supplier information available.
This procurement was divided into 1 lots, each awarded separately.
| Lot | Value | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Lot 1 Sept 2026 – Aug 2031 | - | planning |
Changes the buyer published to this notice after it first appeared.
This notice has been edited.
Amendment made to Description section. Following further consideration of UKRI's requirements and relevant national security considerations, UKRI has determined that the procurement described below will not proceed as previously indicated.