Index › Competition
How contested is public tendering?
Across 405,956 Quebec tenders with named bidders, the average call draws 1.98 bids and 67.4% close with a single offer — but the spread by category is the story.
Where bidder identities are published — Quebec's tender notices name every bidder — competition becomes measurable directly rather than by inference. Across 405,956 calls for tenders since 2021, the average tender draws 1.98 bidders and 67.4% close with a single offer. The average is not the story; the spread by category is.
Competition intensity by category
| Category | Tenders | Avg bidders | Single-bid rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Works | 78,474 | 3.14 | 34.6% |
| Services | 184,316 | 1.78 | 75.4% |
| Goods | 110,873 | 1.61 | 74.4% |
Public construction is the contested core of public tendering. Works tenders average 3.14 bidders and only 34.6% end with a single offer. Services — the largest category at 184,316 tenders — average 1.78 bidders, and three in four close with exactly one bid. Goods are thinner still at 1.61. A services tender is roughly half as likely to be contested as a works tender.
For buyers, the single-bid rate is a price-discovery problem: a tender with one bidder tests nothing, and award value rests on the estimate rather than the market. For suppliers it cuts both ways — services markets are winnable without contest, while works markets reward incumbency and estimating precision.
Who meets whom
Bidder-level records also show which firms repeatedly face each other. The most frequent head-to-head pairings, by number of shared tenders:
| Firm A | Firm B | Shared tenders |
|---|---|---|
| CIMA+ S.E.N.C. | WSP CANADA INC. | 712 |
| CIMA+ S.E.N.C. | LES SERVICES EXP INC. | 624 |
| Eurovia Québec Construction Inc. | ROXBORO EXCAVATION INC. | 600 |
| STANTEC EXPERTS-CONSEILS LTÉE | WSP CANADA INC. | 555 |
| LES SERVICES EXP INC. | WSP CANADA INC. | 517 |
| CIMA+ S.E.N.C. | STANTEC EXPERTS-CONSEILS LTÉE | 504 |
| GBI EXPERTS-CONSEILS INC. | LES SERVICES EXP INC. | 487 |
| BOUTHILLETTE PARIZEAU INC. | CIMA+ S.E.N.C. | 456 |
Engineering procurement is effectively a recurring round-robin: CIMA+ S.E.N.C. and WSP CANADA INC. met on 712 tenders — most of a career's worth of bids in any other industry. These are also the firms with the most total wins, as the Quebec series shows.
Suppliers use live competition data in PubSec.Pro.