Government announces IT supplier advocate to help SMEs win contract work

The IT industry is being provided with a broker and spokesperson to help SMEs gain information about Government contracts which they normally could not access, Senators Kim Carr and Kate Lundy have announced.

The IT Supplier Advocate role, which is part of Carr’s $8.2 million supplier advocate program, will join advocates in the rail and steel industries in order to help SMEs gain a competitive edge.

“We want Australian IT firms, particularly SMEs, to have the best chance of getting in the game and the best chance of winning,” the senators said in a statement. “It is vital that government has access to the nimble, innovative capacity of IT small businesses and equally, they have access to government.”

The advocate will help SMEs gain contracts they may not have been aware of, act as a broker between firms and government agencies and help eradicate problems which prevent smaller companies from being awarded work.

Lundy said at the CeBIT conference in Germany a number of these problems are concerned with risk management, with government agencies concerned about the ability of SMEs to do the work required.

“There have been some tangible barriers to entry for them such as professional indemnity insurance has been overblown and unnecessarily high – sometimes far higher than the value of the contract,” Senator Lundy said.

“An IT Supplier Advocate would be able to say to government – this is an unreasonable level of professional indemnity where you have to insure for a million dollars where the contract is worth $100,000.”

Lundy said another major problem has been the cost of accessing these tenders, which has traditionally been too high for SMEs to meet.

“It’s another barrier and tenders often require a level of capability within a bidding company that is way beyond what the contract is for and this has the effect of excluding local firms as well because the multinationals can tick every box,” she said. “We can stifle innovation if there isn’t genuine market access.”

National ICT Australia’s eGovernment Technology Cluster has said it will work with the advocate to help SMEs field test and prove the viability of their products, with the IT Industry Innovation Council to provide advice on the appointment.

An announcement is expected by the end of the month.