An Alliance Development Agreement is executed between each of the shortlisted Proponents and the Owner. Where it is allowed by jurisdictional policies and practices, the Owner can offer a capped fee-for-service agreement through which the Owner reimburses the Proponents' costs incurred to develop their Full Project Proposals. The Owner will retain the IP rights to any material developed during this phase, regardless of which Proponent is successful in selection. The Owner can then use this IP to enhance the successful Proponent's Final Project Proposal.
The shortlisted Proponents each develop a Final Project Proposal that contains:
• Project Solution;
• Proposed Team;
• Proposed Commercial Arrangements; and
• TOC.
These Final Project Proposals are developed with interaction by the Owner. The Owner also uses this interactive development activity to assess the Proponents' performance against the non-price selection criteria in the context of the Proponents actually undertaking project activities (rather than participating in artificial interviews, scenarios or role-playing).
A competitive selection process allows Proponents to differentiate themselves by demonstrating their capabilities, capacity and commercial attractiveness.
It is expected that the Owner will establish processes to ensure that as each Proponent's Final Project Proposal is developing, there is adequate separation of Owner Participants to assure a robust competitive process between the Proponents that satisfies probity requirements, while maximising Owner interaction.
This topic is considered in more detail in Guidance Note 5.