AQMN Lodges FOI Requests over SME Treatment in Digital Marketplace 2 Procurement

AQMN has filed Freedom of Information (FOI) applications to uncover how small and medium enterprises were treated in the Digital Marketplace Panel 2 (DMP2) procurement process. The aim: ensure transparency around evaluation, compliance, and access barriers for SMEs.

Why FOI Matters for Industry

DMP2 is the federal government’s major procurement platform for digital and ICT services. Its design promises broader SME access, transparency, and fair competition. Digital Transformation Agency+1 However, manufacturers and suppliers have raised concerns about how evaluators applied rules, how categories were assigned, and whether terms favored incumbents.

By lodging FOI applications, AQMN seeks internal records, evaluation criteria, correspondence, and internal guidance that may demonstrate whether SMEs were disadvantaged or unfairly filtered out.

What AQMN is Asking For

The FOI requests focus on key areas:

• The evaluation matrices and scoring applied to SME bids.
• Internal advice or guidance to evaluation panels about SME eligibility.
• Records of questions and clarifications from bidders, and how responses were handled.
• Any internal memoranda discussing balance between SME participation and Government standards.
• Correspondence that speaks to categorisation, module assignments, or threshold decisions.

With this data, AQMN aims to benchmark what actually occurred against the published DMP2 rules and help clients respond to future rounds or challenge process errors.

Legal & Strategic Approach

AQMN’s filings leverage its experience in procurement law, transparency regimes, and Commonwealth process. The team structured requests to target non-exempt records (i.e., those that should be subject to disclosure). Where records are withheld, AQMN is prepared to review refusal notices, lodge internal reviews, and escalate to the Information Commissioner if necessary.

This approach is not just about transparency, it supports clients in seeing risk in past procurements and shaping future bids with informed strategy.

What Clients Can Learn

• How evaluation panels actually scored and ranked SME bids.
• How “fit-to-module” decisions were made (for example, categorising capability).
• What internal guidance existed to steer assessors.

• Whether good-faith clarification or rebuttal steps were followed for SMEs.

   

With that knowledge, AQMN can help clients prepare stronger bids, identify grounds for review, or make representations backed by internal documents rather than guesswork.

Public Accountability & Industry Trust

Transparency is essential in procurement, especially when smaller players depend on equal access. AQMN’s FOI actions reinforce that scrutiny over major platforms like DMP2 is not optional. It’s necessary for market fairness, policy confidence, and accountability of evaluation outcomes.