Research Article

Bidders Recommender for Public Procurement Auctions Using Machine Learning: Data Analysis, Algorithm, and Case Study with Tenders from Spain

Table 1

Most relevant data fields in the Spanish Public Procurement Notices (tenders) used in the dataset.

NameDescriptionName column dataset

Tender statusStatus of the tender during the development of the procedure: prior notice, in time, pending adjudication, awarded, resolved, or cancelledNot used (similar to Result_code)
Contract file numberUnique identifier for a contract fileNot used
Object of the contractSummary description of the contractNot used (unstructured textual information)
Public procurement agencyPublic procurement agency that made the tender: name, identifier (NIF or DIR3), website, address, postal code, city, country, contact name, telephone, fax, e-mail, etc. CCAA is the Autonomous Community which is a first-level division in Spain. Latitude and longitude have been calculated from postal code, and they are not official fields in the notice.Name_Organisation Postalzone
CCAA
Province
Municipality
Latitude
Longitude
Tender priceAmount of bidding budgeted (taxes included)Tender_Price
DurationTime (days) to execute the contractDuration
CPV classificationCPV (Common Procurement Vocabulary) is a European system for classifying the type of work in public contracts defined in the Commission Regulation (EC) No 213/2008: http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg/2008/213/ojCPV
The numerical code consists of 8 digits, subdivided into divisions (first 2 digits of the code), groups (first 3 digits), classes (first 4 digits), and categories (first 5 digits)CPV_Aggregated (first 2 digits of the CPV number)
Contract typeType of contract defined by legislation (Law 9/2017): works, services, supplies, public works concession, works concession, public services management, services concession, public sector and private sector collaboration, special administrative, private, patrimonial, or othersType_code
Contract subtypeCode to indicate a subtype of contract. If it is a type of service contract: based upon the 2004/18/CE Directive, Annex II. If it is a type of works contract: works contract codes defined by the Spanish DGPE.Subtype_code
Contract execution placeContract’s execution has a place through the Nomenclature of Statistical Territorial Units (NUTS), created by Eurostat [47]Not used (assumed equal to postalzone)
Type of procedureProcedure by which the contracts was awarded: open, restricted, negotiated with advertising, negotiated without publicity, competitive dialogue, internal rules, derived from framework agreement, project contest, simplified open, association for innovation, derivative of association for innovation, based on a system dynamic acquisition, bidding with negotiation, or othersProcedure_code
Contracting systemThe contracting system indicates whether it is a contract itself or a framework agreement or dynamic acquisition systemNot used
Type of processingType of processing: ordinary, urgent, or emergencyUrgency_code
Award resultType of results: awarded, formalised, desert, resignation, and withdrawalResult_code
Winner identifier (CIF)Identifier of the winning bidder (called CIF in Spain) and its province (region)CIF_Winner
Winner_Province
Award priceAmount offered by the winning bidder of the contract (taxes included)Award_Price
DateDate of agreement in the award of the contractDate
Number of received offersNumber of received offers (bidders participating) in each tenderReceived_Offers