Published date: 25 May 2023

Closed future opportunity - This means that a potential contract has passed its approach to market date. A buyer can choose to consider any supplier interest or convert this notice into an opportunity ready for live procurement.


Approach to market date: 14 July 2023

Contract summary

Industry

  • Military research and technology - 73410000

Location of contract

Any region

Value of contract

£1,730,000 to £3,500,000

Procurement reference

tender_369363/1214883

Published date

25 May 2023

Approach to market date

14 July 2023

Contract start date

1 October 2023

Contract end date

30 September 2027

Contract is suitable for SMEs?

No

Contract is suitable for VCSEs?

No

Description

The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) is part of the UK Ministry of Defence. Historically, Dstl has run a number of individual procurement calls for a variety of PhD requirements. Each of these calls has had a different theme and application process. Dstl currently run these calls through its R-Cloud: marketplace for defence science and technology research.

Following a review of how Dstl delivers its PhD calls, Dstl is planning to run a single call (via R-Cloud) covering a number of different themes, with a single application process, instead of running multiple calls.

It is intended that this call will be formally launched during July 2023. The call will cover a number of different Technology areas, including but not limited to:

Chemical, Biological and Radiological
Advanced Materials
Comms and Networks
Sensing

Additional PhD requirements may arise during the period of this Prior Information Notice, and therefore the scope may increase to further technology areas to those stated above.

As stated above, the PhD call will be launched via the Dstl R-Cloud: Marketplace for defence science and technology research.

The way that R-Cloud operates is that you have to initially apply to join R-Cloud. Crucially, only those suppliers who are successfully registered on R-Cloud on the date of call launch (planned for the 14th July 2023) will be eligible to participate. Failure to successfully register on R-Cloud before this date will mean you will be ineligible to participate in the call. You are therefore encouraged to submit any application to join R-Cloud at your earliest opportunity.

To find out more about R-Cloud, please visit www.gov.uk/guidance/r-cloud

To formally register to join R-Cloud, and be notified of both this specific PhD call and other Dstl research funding opportunities, you can click the link on the above web-page, or alternatively visit www.rcloud.dstl.gov.uk to begin the application process. A copy of the terms and conditions which apply to any task awarded under R-Cloud are linked on this page, and you are required to accept those terms as part of your application process.

Before submitting an application to join R-Cloud, you can check if your university/public institution is already registered on R-Cloud by discussing with your university commercial departments, or alternatively visiting www.rcloud.dstl.gov.uk/capability-area/suppliers. If in doubt, contact us.

Note - Dstl does not accept R-Cloud/PhD applications from individual students or academics; if you are a student or academic you will need to approach a relevant department at a university/public institution.

This notice is issued as a Prior Information Notice and announces our intention to potentially run a PhD call. This is not issued as a formal contract notice and is not inviting expressions of interest. If you are interested in participating in any future call, please apply to join R-Cloud as set out above.

About the buyer

Address

Building 5, Room G-02, Porton Down
Salisbury
SP4 0JQ
England

Email

caflynn@dstl.gov.uk