Each quarter TenderFlare publishes an index of Irish public procurement activity, drawn from the eTenders / OGP open dataset. Here is what the first quarter of 2026 looked like.
A record pipeline, led by infrastructure
Irish public bodies put 2,109 new contract notices to market in Q1 2026, up 16% on Q1 2025 (1,811) and the third consecutive year-on-year increase for a first quarter. The combined estimated value of that pipeline reached roughly €23 billion - the highest first-quarter figure on record - though that total is heavily weighted by a small number of large multi-year framework agreements (see “How to read the value figures” below).
On the awards side, 1,525 contracts worth €4.33 billion were awarded in the quarter (counted by award date). The median contract was €215,000 - the clearest picture of a typical public deal - while the average of €2.84 million reflects the pull of a handful of very large frameworks.
How to read the value figures
Large frameworks distort headline totals. A single “Building construction work” classification accounted for roughly €8bn of estimated value across just 23 notices, because framework values are multi-year ceilings shared across multiple suppliers, not single contracts. For that reason this Index leads with notice counts and median values, and treats the multi-billion totals as directional colour rather than spend that will all be drawn down in the quarter.
Who is buying
By volume (most active buyers):
| Buyer | Notices |
|---|---|
| Health Service Executive (HSE) | 100 |
| Office of Government Procurement | 87 |
| Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage | 43 |
| Office of Public Works | 41 |
| Education Procurement Service | 37 |
| Limerick City and County Council | 31 |
| Iarnrod Eireann | 30 |
The HSE is by some distance the single most active buyer. Local authorities form a long, steady tail (Mayo, Dublin City, Carlow, Donegal and others each in the low-to-mid twenties).
By value (where the money is) - an infrastructure story:
| Buyer | Notices | Estimated value |
|---|---|---|
| Transport Infrastructure Ireland | 9 | €8.76bn |
| Uisce Eireann | 6 | €3.94bn |
| Health Service Executive | 100 | €1.85bn |
| Cork Education and Training Board | 4 | €1.50bn |
| Cluid Housing | 6 | €1.40bn |
| ESB | 14 | €0.72bn |
Transport Infrastructure Ireland and Uisce Eireann alone account for around €12.7bn of framework value from just 15 notices - the National Development Plan capital programme in water and transport.
What is being bought
By count, the market is services-led; by value, it is works-led.
| Contract type | Notices | Share of notices | Estimated value | Share of value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Services | 990 | 53.3% | €2.58bn | 11.3% |
| Works | 380 | 20.5% | €16.06bn | 70.0% |
| Supplies | 351 | 18.9% | €2.36bn | 10.3% |
| Work-related services | 135 | 7.3% | €1.93bn | 8.4% |
Share of notices Share of estimated value
Services is over half the quarter’s notices but a ninth of its value. Works is a fifth of the notices and seven tenths of the value. Those are two different maps of the same market, and a bid team needs both: one shows where the deal flow is, the other where the capital is committed.
Hottest sectors (by notice count):
| Sector (CPV) | Notices |
|---|---|
| School meals | 145 |
| Construction work | 140 |
| IT services (consulting, software, development) | 100 |
| Architectural / construction / engineering services | 57 |
| Education and training services | 48 |
| Financial consultancy services | 45 |
The standout mover is school meals (145 notices), reflecting the national Hot School Meals programme expansion - a rare, concentrated opportunity for catering and food-supply SMEs.
By spend category:
| Category | Notices |
|---|---|
| Minor Building Works and Civils | 385 |
| Facilities Management and Maintenance | 334 |
| Professional Services | 316 |
| Information and Communication Technology | 238 |
| Fleet / Plant | 173 |
Competition and access
Most procurement here is SME-accessible, and the market is genuinely open rather than gated.
| Threshold | Notices | Share |
|---|---|---|
| National (below EU threshold) | 1,108 | 59.7% |
| OJEU (at or above EU threshold) | 748 | 40.3% |
+253 direct-invite competitions88% Open Procedure (1,633)
Competition is moderate. Awarded contracts drew an average of 4.2 bids (median 3), but a meaningful minority attracted no competition at all.
The biggest awards of the quarter
These are predominantly multi-year, multi-supplier framework agreements; the value shown is the framework ceiling.
| Award | Buyer | Value | Winner(s) |
|---|---|---|---|
| HSE Design Team Services Framework | HSE | €500m | AtkinsRealis / J.V. Tierney and Co JV |
| Multi-supplier Design Framework | Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown CC | €350m | ABM Contractors / Axis Construction JV |
| Cash Payment Services | Dept of Social Protection | €261m | An Post |
| HSE Design Team Services Framework | HSE | €250m | Avanti Architects / O'Connell Mahon JV |
| Civil Works Framework | Dublin Port Company | €200m | Wills Bros Ltd |
| ICT telecoms framework (ITC017F) | Office of Government Procurement | €150m | eircom (eir business) and others |
| GSM-R Phase 4 Civils Works | Iarnrod Eireann | €130m | Pod-Trak Infrastructure |
| Natural Gas Supply | Office of Government Procurement | €125m | Bord Gais Energy |
The winners’ table reads as a who’s-who of Ireland’s engineering and construction sector: AtkinsRealis, Arup, PJ Hegarty, John Sisk, Wills Bros and others recur across the largest design and civils frameworks.
Sector spotlights
Construction and civils
The single biggest sector this quarter: 356 construction notices with an estimated value of €13.7bn, driven by the TII and Uisce Eireann capital programmes and a wave of council and HSE design and civils frameworks. For contractors and consultancies, framework positions awarded now define the next several years of access.
Engineering and architectural consultancy
276 notices, ~€2.3bn. The HSE and several local authorities are establishing large multidisciplinary design frameworks (HSE Design Team frameworks alone exceed €750m across two awards). For engineering and architecture firms, the framework land-grab is the defining dynamic of the quarter.
IT and software
167 IT-services notices plus 77 software notices (~€0.5bn combined). The OGP ICT frameworks remain the principal route to public-sector IT spend, with established suppliers winning repeat positions.
Methodology
Figures are drawn from the eTenders / OGP open dataset published via data.gov.ie and loaded into TenderFlare. The dataset is released quarterly; Q1 2026 covers notices published 1 January to 31 March 2026. Notice counts and estimated values use publication date. Award counts and award values use award date and are complete to approximately end-May 2026. Estimated and award values for framework agreements represent ceiling values, not committed single-contract spend. Contract-type shares are calculated across the four contract types (1,856 notices, €22.93bn), which is narrower than the whole-quarter totals because not every notice carries a contract-type classification. Figures exclude duplicate cross-source records.
See any of these buyers up close: TenderFlare shows who they buy from, what they pay, and which competitions drew only a single bidder. Search Irish public tenders for free, or see TenderFlare Pro for full buyer and supplier profiles across every contracting authority in this dataset. Founding-member pricing is still open on the pricing page.
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