DN298357-Provision of UK-China Infrastructure Academy

The Department for Trade is looking for a strategic supplier to provide a UK-China Infrastructure Academy. The Academy is a training programme offering courses, seminars and workshops to senior executives from Chinese businesses and officials from the Chinese Government to cover all aspects of the market context related to UK infrastructure, energy and regeneration projects, with the aim of facilitating and accelerating high-quality Chinese investment into the UK.

The programme is intended to offer practical, applicable knowledge and skills, (not pure academic training), to increase the capabilities of the delegates and their businesses to successfully invest into UK infrastructure. Through participation in the programme delegates are expected to develop understanding of both technical processes for UK infrastructure projects and investment (policies, regulation, legal regimes, planning, financing, procurement, risk management, market entry, standards etc.) as well as UK business norms such as working with government, stakeholder engagement, forming consortia and building credible advisory teams.

The Academy will also be used as a platform to showcase UK investment opportunities to the Chinese delegates, in each case relating to the overall programme theme, and aligned with UK inward investment priorities. The Contractor will be expected to incorporate this into the programme, working in conjunction with the Authority. In addition to the formal training activities, the Academy will include business networking and matching making opportunities with UK businesses.

The programme will be thematic and modular in approach with delegates spending five nights/five days on a residential programme in the UK. It will be the potential provider's responsibility to provide all venues and accommodation for the Delegates as well as sourcing the speakers, facilitators and trainers.

The successful Contractor will be required to deliver two, five day training courses in the UK for Chinese delegates as part of the Infrastructure Academy, to be delivered in both Chinese and English with simultaneous translation.

The themes for the initial two courses will be Energy and Rail. The Authority will identify and select the delegates based on their relevance to the Energy and Rail sectors. If additional eight courses are required, they will be in a similar format and likely to be around themes related to Transport, Energy and Regeneration. Specific details will be agreed jointly between the Authority, Contractor and the Chinese Government before the option to extend is taken.

The successful Contractor will deliver the two courses by 31 March 2018). The first course on Energy should ideally take place 28 January to 2 February 2018 and the second course on Rail should take place by 31 March 2018, with dates to be agreed between the Customer and the successful Contractor. There is potential for up to a further eight courses over the period 01 April 2020