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About the buyer

University of Exeter is a higher education institution that runs its own procurement centrally through a dedicated Procurement Services team. Suppliers register on CTM, the university's e-tendering system, to monitor and respond to opportunities as they appear. Larger contracts above this threshold are advertised nationally through Find a Tender and Contracts Finder. Much of this procurement flows through frameworks including the Southern Universities Purchasing Consortium and the Crown Commercial Service. Catering contracts run through the separate TUCO framework. Competitive tendering, not a fixed list of approved suppliers, decides who wins the work in the end.

Education procurement reached £47.4bn in 2024/25, the fourth-largest public sector budget.

Over the past 5 years, most of University of Exeter's contract awards have been in construction work, IT services and laboratory and precision equipment.