Euroalert.net - EN

New App to be informed of the latest news and press calls from the European Commission in Spanish

2012-05-11T09:53:00.002+02:00

Did you know that the Representation of the European Commission in Spain launched an app in collaboration with Euroalert? You can now download for iPhone and Android a mobile app where you will be able to will find the latest European news. The app lets you see the news of the European Commission, European events taking place in Spain as well as the press calls for journalists interested in covering European affairs.

In addition to this app, you can also add this information to your personalized iGoogle gadget. With the app and the gadget, the European Commission intends to make available its activities in Spain to the public and provide to Spanish citizens a quick and easy access to European information. Francisco Fonseca, head of the Representation of the European Commission in Spain highlighted at the moment of the launching last November, that in this way, citizens will get European information without having to actively search through the new uses that are being imposed.

Euroalert team is very proud to have participated as a developer on this project. Also today we express our satisfaction with the number of downloads that the application is having on both iPhone and Android because it means what is useful for citizens.

As you know applications can be downloaded for free from the App Store and Google Play Market and from the website of the Representation of the European Commission in Spain and of course, from the Euroalert online store. Your comments, tweets, +1' s, likes, reviews and ratings to the app will help us to further improve its implementation, making it more useful for you all.

9 of May: Celebrate the Europe Day with Euroalert

2012-05-07T10:22:00.000+02:00

Since Robert Schuman delivered his famous 'Schuman Declaration' on 9th of May 1950, Europeans celebrated that day the Europe Day. This statement officially has started what is today known as the European Union, but back then it started the European Coal and Steel Community.

Although 9th of May is not a national holiday in any of the 27 Member States, as you can see on the calendar that we created, Representations of the European institutions such as the Representation of the European Commission in Spain, they do celebrate that day events to promote the European spirit. Among these activities, the European Commission in Spain has made available a mobile application for Android and iPhone, and with the collaboration of Euroalert, so as not to miss any detail of the celebrations and that also allows you to know the latest news related to the EU.

In Euroalert, most of the content is related to the European Union. You can access to the EU breaking news from our News section and select the specific topic that interests you. You can also install a widget on your website with this news and customize it. On the other hand, if the information you need is related to financing and business opportunities in the EU, you can check the grants issued by the European institutions and also adapt them to your web through a widget that you can customize. Regarding the business opportunities that are published in the EU, among other competitive intelligence products, we "alert you" on the public tenders relevant to your business through our alert system 10ders Alerts. We can not forget the European legislation that is published daily in the EU Official Journal (OJEU). You can also follow it in Euroalert through our newsletters. In the coming weeks, we will announce important developments in our products competitive intelligence in public tenders that surely will be very useful for you.

This is the way that Euroalert has to celebrate the 9th of May, Europe Day with you: bringing you the European information you may need and what else you might be interested. If you want more information about any of our products you can visit our online store or contact us via e-mail or via Twitter and Facebook.

Euroalert releases and shares for free the calendar on public holidays in the whole EU in 2012

2012-04-09T18:44:00.001+02:00

The European Union publishes every year in the EU Official Journal (OJEU) the national public holidays that take place in Member States with information provided by the countries themselves.

The calendar is published in a PDF format into the OJEU which is not as useful as it could for businesses or citizens. For example a SME that wants to expand its market to another EU country will surely need to know in advance, in a fast and simple way, the public holidays in each EU country. European citizens that organize a vacation travel within the EU would also be interested in knowing in advance if their scheduled days coincide with a public holiday. It is unlikely that in any of these cases, users would look for the information in the Official Journal.

For this reason in Euroalert, we have decided to transform this information into data that can be easily used or re-used, i.e. into an iCalendar that can be read from Google Calendar or from many other calendar applications developed for SmartPhones, tablets or computers. We'd like to thank you for your trust in our services and that's why we have released the EU Public Holiday Calendar with a license that allows you to use it completely for free.

In order to enjoy this calendar of public holidays in the EU, you only have to download it from Euroalert and, if you have any further question, you can contact us by email or via our Twitter profile and through the Euroalert Facebook page.

Euroalert.net speaks about Competitive Intelligence and Public Procurement at Bureau Veritas Business School

2012-03-26T14:52:00.001+02:00

On February 23 we had the pleasure to take part in a webinar organized by Bureau Veritas Business School and talk about Competitive Intelligence and Public Procurement. It was a great opportunity to share with all the participants Euroalert.net experience in creating value-added Competitive Intelligence services based in public procurement especially designed for SMEs active in exportation.

Over 45 minutes we went through the current situation in European public procurement market and how Competitive Intelligence techniques can be applied in order to enhance the commercial strategies of any company. It was also the case to explain how there are many tools beyond public contracts alerts, such as lists of successful bidders, which can help companies to translate a huge amount of data into useful and manageable knowledge to be used in strategic decisions.

You can watch the video of the webinar entitled “Commercial Intelligence and Public Procurement” at Bureau Veritas Business School on-line platform (this time there is only a Spanish version). You can also have a look at the presentation we used for the session.

Commercial Intelligence and Public Procurement (Spanish version)

View more presentations from Euroalert.net

There will be similar seminars and workshops over this year, where Euroalert.net Team will deal with some of the ways to take full advantage of all the information and opportunities brought by public contract announcements. If you want to keep track of all these events, you can do it through our Twitter profile and at Euroalert.net Facebook page.

Euroalert experience at the Open Government event celebrated at the EOI

2012-03-09T10:55:00.000+01:00

Last week, we had the opportunity to present our work as a company powered by open data, i.e. a company that uses data from public sector to create information services to companies across Europe. As usual, we contribute with our experience to the first #RunOgov: "Open Government: Challenge and Opportunity" event held on 28 February at the "Escuela de Organización Industrial (EOI)" organized by the "Club de Innovación" and sponsored by Telefónica.

It was a pleasure to share a very interesting day with leading people in the Spanish open data community and with others who are bursting with strength and also, to help make the community more stronger -at least, a little more. Throughout the morning, we learned that, Neelie Kroes, Vice president of the European Commission answered in her blog to the campaign for a single Open Data licence in the European Union. Of course it was something very commented among the attendees, having regard that the campaign had its origin in Spain and it is a great example of Open Government.

At the event, it was also discussed very important issues as the announcement made by the Spanish government on its works in a Spanish Digital Agenda. Given Euroalert involvement in the European Digital Agenda, we look forward to it because it should mean a boost for our digital economy. Besides, it was also relevant the announcement made by the Director General of Analysis and Planning from Castilla y Leon (Spanish region), on the upcoming launch of an Open Government strategy for this region. Within this strategy, it will be launched an Open Data portal that we hope we can use it to extend the governments contracts data, that feed our international market intelligence services.

As usual, we provide you the presentation we made at the event.

Euroalert, una compañía open data

Euroalert.net spends one day with SMEs and entrepreneurs at the “Salón Mi Empresa 2012”

2012-02-21T14:40:00.000+01:00

Last February 15 we had the opportunity to spend one day at the “Salón Mi Empresa”, My Business Exhibition, an event held in Madrid for the third consecutive year. The forum brought together experts, companies and public bodies aiming to bring solutions for the issues which most concern small businesses and entrepreneurs. As a company dedicated to develop commercial intelligence tools for SMEs based on public procurement and government contracts, knowing at first hand what these kind of businesses expect and which are their needs, is something Euroalert.net is particularly interested in.

At the exhibitors area delegates had access to solutions adapted to their businesses as well as to public institutions which can help them to launch their projects and make them grow, such as the Spanish Directorate General for SME Policy, the Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade (ICEX), the Spanish High Council of Chambers of Commerce, or Madrid Emprende Economic Development Agency, among other organizations and associations which provide help for businesses and entrepreneurs. Besides these contact points, “Salón Mi Empresa” also consisted of 6 conference rooms, where speakers from different backgrounds addressed topics such as financial aspects for entrepreneurs and small businesses, how social media can be used to increase small businesses' performance, aspects related to franchising or issues related to SMEs internationalisation process, a field where Euroalert.net is working intensively to provide quality services.

It was an intense work day which brought us an occasion to meet companies and organizations we already had the opportunity to collaborate with, as well as a good opportunity to meet new people and greet some old friends, like those from Gestiona Radio with whom Euroalert.net was happy to collaborate a couple of months ago in their programme “Esto es Europa”, This is Europe, and who were making their programme “Primera Hora”, First Hour, at the Salón Mi Empresa.

It was also quite a rewarding experience to see how, despite current difficulties, there are still people willing to start up businesses, sharing innovative ideas and with loads of optimism to move their projects forward. For all of them, Euroalert.net will keep on improving to offer the best available information services and commercial intelligence tools such as our public contracts winners lists or our tender alerts for contracts available in any EU country.

A new review of the functioning of the Common Procurement Vocabulary CPV is on track

2012-02-07T16:23:00.000+01:00

Although there is no mandatory frequency, a review of the Common Procurement Vocabulary (CPV) is made about every four years. Since the Official Journal of the EU has recently published the award of the contract for the review of the functioning of the CPV Regulation and codes, a new revision seems to be already on track. These process started back in August 2011, when the DG for the Internal Market and Services announced a contract notice to make a study on the review of the functioning of the coding currently applying to public tenders.

The Common Procurement Vocabulary published by Regulation (EC) 2195/2002 aims to provide public authorities with a common base to formulate their procurement needs and for companies to better identify business opportunities in public procurement procedures. Choosing the right codes according to the purpose of a contract notices is, indeed, one of the key elements to match both parts of the procurement process: the contracting authority and the potential bidders.

CPV codes contribute to define the object of the contract in public procurement notices, easing the purchasing process. Furthermore, this common coding system enhances the cross-border element in procurement by facilitating companies to bid for contracts in other Member states, therefore contributing to a better functioning of the EU Single Market.

The Danish company to whom the contract has been awarded will have to assess whether the current CPV coding system meets the objectives it was established for. It will also have to evaluate if these objectives are actually relevant and if they are achieved in an efficient and effective manner. The contractor will have a period of twelve months to deliver the works, while interviews, analysis, questionnaires and all the necessary evaluation processes will be performed.

Whatever the results of the study and the proposed changes to the CPV will be, Euroalert.net will be vigilant and will adapt all the services just as it was done for the 2008 CPV codes review. These commercial intelligence services based on public procurement designed for SMEs are those which allow, e.g., to track the publication of this particular tender for the review of the CPV, and to know afterwards which company has won the contract.

By the way, if you feel curious, these are the CPV codes applied to the tender for the CPV review: 79313000, 79419000, 72330000, 79330000, 72221000. Do you think they meet their objectives? If you want to know which services they describe and know a bit more about the system itself, you can always have a look at the CPV codes lists description page at Euroalert.net website.

Taking notes at The Single Market Opportunity event

2012-01-30T09:18:00.002+01:00

On January 24 we were lucky enough to attend The Single Market Opportunity event that Google organized in Brussels to discuss the opportunities that a single market presents and the barriers that still exist in the single European market. As you know, Euroalert aggregates public tenders published by the EU countries with the aim that the opportunities in public procurement of the single market can be better used by small and medium enterprises. Thus, it was very interesting to us to attend to all discussions held at the Google's event.

Of course, the discussion focused on the advances that have taken place in recent years due to the firm commitment of the European Commission for improving SMEs competitiveness through the opportunities of the Single Market. However, it was also extensively discussed the major barriers that still exist, from the tax system to heterogeneous linguistic diversity, for a European market in which nearly 500 million people live, (data from 1 January 2009) to become a reality.

It was very inspiring to see the experience of the small businesses that Google invited to the event, which share how they have taken advantage of the opportunities offered by Internet and the online marketing to internationalise their services and to access to a larger market. We are sure that it would be more and more companies using existing resources in technology and legislative developments to break down barriers and generate growth. Euroalert will keep working for helping to better enable European SMEs to improve their competitive intelligence in the Single Market with Euroalert's products such as, the Alerts on Government contracts in the European Union and the List of Government Contracts Winners in the EU.

Euroalert presents its experience at the Open Software World Conference 2012 and the W3C Day in Spain

2012-01-19T16:53:00.002+01:00

Marc Garriga at the OSWC 2012

Last week, Euroalert experienced in Granada a few intense days during the celebration of the Open Software World Conference 2012 (OSWC2012), which it is organised every year by the Andalusian Regional Government in collaboration with the CENATIC and the Regional Government of Extremadura. It was intense because we had the opportunity to present our experience on two Open Data events, held during those days with very different approaches. In both events, we explain how we collect the data that we use as raw material for our business intelligence products based on a public procurement analysis.

On January 12, Euroalert participated in the W3C Day in Spain, to which we were invited by our friends from the W3C Spain Office – office which as you know is hosted by CTIC Foundation. Following a presentation on the OpenData initiative from the Andalusian Regional Government given by Cristina Puente, Carlos de la Fuente moderated a panel discussion which was provocatively entitled as follows "PSI re-use... is there anyone there?". On this panel, we could offer our views on issues such as the Spanish Royal Decree 1495/2011, the need for a transparency regulation or PSI re-use business characterization. Additionally to the consensus reached on the need to publish much more data, the main conclusion was the need to give some further steps to consolidate the Community Open Data in Spain. Euroalert certainly tries to contribute as much as possible to this aim. On the panel, we were accompanied by Emilio Garcia, from the Finance and Public Administration Ministry, Jorge Campanillas, from Iurismatica company, Alberto Ortiz from Open Data Euskadi and María Jesús Fernández, from Open Data Zaragoza. On the hashtag #diaw3c, there is much information on what it was said there.

On the other hand, on January 13 we contribute with our experience to the debate that was proposed in the "OpenData, an opportunity for business and competitiveness" panel, organised by the OSWC2012. The panel discussion was about the business opportunities that exist concerning the re-use of public sector information. It was moderated by Guzmán Garmendia, General Director of Open Government and New Technologies department from the Government of Navarre, and it was at the discussion Jose Antonio Recio from Fundecyt, Jesus María Alonso from AtoS and Marc Garriga, from the Barcelona City Council. The debate focused around the potential of public data to generate wealth and such as Guzmán Garmendia and Marc Garriga highlighted, the importance of the joint work of public administrations that release data and companies that intend to re-use them.

Throughout the conference we had the opportunity to talk with many members of the Spanish Open Data Community, and we were very proud to participate in the meeting organised by Open Data Sevilla. We were also kindly invited to bring our vision to this newborn group of proactive citizens in the development of open data initiatives, and we enjoyed the occasion to wish them all the luck in doing this work, which will benefit everyone.

In addition to the Euroalert photo album in the OSWC 2012, we want to share with all of you as usually, both presentation that we used in the Open Software World Conference:

Adding public procurement data to create value for SMEs

and the one we used on the W3C Day in Spain:

How does Euroalert use Spanish Open Data portals?

The Euroalert Community expands to Google+

2012-01-03T20:01:00.000+01:00

In addition to wish you a happy and great 2012, we want to start sharing with you our new Euroalert's Google+ page. This page has been created to provide a new place to share our contents and for the conversation among the Euroalert Community members. If you add Euroalert page to your Google+ circles, you can make comments to the most significant contents provided by Euroalert. Of course, you can keep doing +1 to any content we publish and you liked or that have been useful for you.

Likely you are already part of one of the platforms and services that we use to enable to the Euroalert Community members a direct way to enjoy our contents. However, we will use this post to summarize all the services where you can find our contents completely for free. For example, more than 2200 users are already following Euroalert.net content concerning the European Union in both English and Spanish via Twitter. If you decide to follow Euroalert on Twitter, you will be able to find the latest news about the EU, the EU grants to finance projects and information on relevant public contracts and tenders. In other words, you will enjoy a small sample of the free contents published on the Euroalert website and included in more advanced products and services that you can find in our online store.

If you use other social networks like Facebook, Euroalert has also a page there and you can always contact us through this page, and through Euroalert page on Linkedin. Our team is available to receive your comments and suggestions through these channels in addition to other more traditional ways such as our e-mail.

On the other hand we also want to remind you about Euroalert free newsletter, that is currently being sent to several thousand people every week, and in which we inform on the most significant up to date European content, EU grants and public contracts. Besides of course this blog, which has as main objective to keep you up to date on our product enhancements and our small achievements as a company. Through Euroalert's profile on SlideShare we share materials from all the events where we participate with the aim of contributing with our experience as a company. From Euroalert albums in Picasa you can download the photos that we have taken in our visits throughout Europe and that we provide to the whole Community.

We would like to know your opinion, as we are always listening to our users in order to figure out the best ways to improve our services, so you can enjoy all the content related to the EU that we provide to the Euroalert Community. By the way, just for those who are already part of our Community, you will enjoy special offers and promotions like the one that we have just launched. Inserting the EURLRT11 code, you are able to get a discount on public contracts alerts and on the customized newsletter on European information.

New rules on thresholds applicable to EU public procurement already published

2011-12-14T11:55:00.000+01:00

Today we want to announce you a new change that will affect public procurement market in the European Union. As we already did in the past by detailing you developments such as the introduction of new CPVs in 2008 or the adaptation to the new features put in place by TED in March 2010, this time it is the matter for the changes introduced by Commission Regulation (EU) nº 1251/2011 of 30 November 2011 which modifies procurement Directives in respect to their application thresholds for the procedures for the awards of contract, and was published in the Official Journal on 2 December.

According to this Regulation, the minimum thresholds applicable to public procurement have been slightly increased. Although these changes will not be quite significant, the new figures will nevertheless have to be taken into account both by contracting authorities when launching procurement procedures, and by those companies interested in taking part in bidding processes for public contracts. The new thresholds will enter into force on 1 January 2012 and be applicable for two years.

Therefore, these new thresholds for the publication of public procurement announcements will change from 125,000 to 130,000 Euro in the case of services and supply contracts issued by central government bodies and from 193,000 to 200,000 Euro in the case of other contracting authorities. For services and supply contracts in the case of utilities and defence threshold will now pass for 387,000 to 400,000 Euro. In the case of work contracts and work concessions these figures will pass from 4,845,000 to 5,000,000 Euro.

On our side we will of course be prepared for any change which should be introduced regarding the tools and services on commercial intelligence based on public procurement that Euroalert.net provides for companies in Europe. We will make sure that you can keep on receiving tender alerts, requesting the lists of tender winners or authorities that you need, or receiving your product reports on public procurement, without being affected by these changes.

We would also like to take this occasion to remind you that if you want to keep track on new legislation published in the OJEU, Euroalert.net Customized Newsletters on EU information can certainly help you. They will allow you to keep up to date, not only about new legal developments, but also about news related to the European Union and funding opportunities for your projects. If you have any questions, you can send us an e-mail us to info@euroalert.net or contact us by any of the means described in our web.

The Representation of the European Commission in Spain launches a mobile application with the help of Euroalert.net

2011-11-21T18:48:00.001+01:00

We are very proud to inform you on our participation in a very special project. Euroalert developed for the Representation of the European Commission in Spain an app for iPhone and Android in order to see its contents on mobile devices. Now, the app has been launched!

The European Commission's news, the European events held in Spain as well as the press calls for journalists interested in covering European issues, are available now on the phone via the free application that launched the Representation of the Commission European in Spain. The new mobile application which can be downloaded from Android phones and iPhone presents the European information in a simple and accessible way. On the same project, it is also presented an iGoogle gadget with the same features thereby allowing the contents from the Representation to this format.

As stated in the official press release, Francisco Fonseca, Head of Representation agrees to this way of presenting the activities of the European Commission in Spain because "it is a basic and necessary step to communicate with citizens and for European information comes to them rather than having to search actively. It aims to facilitate access to the European issues content according to the new and current technological ways of communication. He added that the applications are free so citizens will have even easier access to information on the European Union.

Euroalert.net, which developed the app and the gadget considers that with this step "the European Commission Representation is at the forefront of public institutions in their model of relationship with citizens through the new mobile channel." In addition, we are very pleased to have been able to assist the Commission in Spain to take this step and we're very pleased with the number of downloads so far because this means that the app is useful to citizens in their day to day.

Applications can be downloaded for free from the App Store and Android Market, from the Representation of European Commission in Spain website and from the online store of Euroalert.net. Your comments, tweets, and scores on it, can contribute to improve the application, making it more useful for you all.

Euroalert experience at the Open Days 2011

2011-10-18T19:36:00.001+02:00

Once again, Euroalert has taken part at the Open Days 2011, the European week of Regions and Cities, and our experience, once again, has been very positive. The 9th edition of the Open Days has been a great success that has served to bring together experts and participants from across Europe. The 100 workshops organised with around 6000 participants were aimed at discussing many topics with a single goal, discussing how regions and cities can achieve sustainable growth and thus, help the EU out of the current crisis that we face. At the workshops, we heard ideas to achieve such goal, for example the creation of clusters with public-private funding (PPP) such as the one conducted by Castilla y León (Spain) to make real the “e-vehicle”. With this initiative, Castilla y León proposes a measure to improve the economy without forgetting the respect for the environment. In addition, many wondered at seminars how it would be possible getting out the European regions and cities of the crisis in compliance with this objective, i.e., how to create a truly sustainable economy and not just from an environmental point of view. Another idea heard at the Open Days was the creation of Euroregions, such as the Baltic Sea Euroregion or Pyrenees Mediterranean Euroregion. They consist in associations between border regions to get assistance to citizens more effectively. The associations are determined by the rule of the 150 km adopted by the European Commission, which means that partnerships can be formed only within an area of 150 km. Regional and local authorities do not agreed with this limit and asked the Commission representative during the workshop to remove such rule.

The shadow of the economic crisis has been very present throughout the week. Euroalert had the opportunity to ask the President of the Committee of the Regions herself, Mercedes Bresso, how the European Commission can help in the next budgetary period to the regions and cities at getting out of the current crisis. Ms Bresso recognized that the proposal of the Commission for the budget period 2014-2020 is quite good and defended the temporary creation of the intermediate regions concept. With the creation of this new category, she does not mean that more European funds will be granted to the regions; only an efficient way to distribute them. We thank to the president her kindness for making possible this interview.

In addition to attending a few seminars, Euroalert also had time to tweet the Open Days through the official event hashtag #euopendays, and thus, help you to watch live this great celebration of the regions and cities. Unfortunately there were not many "tweeters" telling what was happening at the Open Days, especially to find out what was being said within the workshops that we could not attend because an overlapping of the schedules. In any case, as in previous years, we thank you for your follow-up and also for the conversations we had in live via Twitter.

We hope you enjoyed our information through our news and tweets, and please, keep reading us in the coming days because Euroalert will tell you more about the topics discussed during the Open Days, such as the workshop on the future of micro-credit, the workshop on how to communicate regional policy today and after 2013 or the workshop how to perform better evaluations of structural funds expenditure by the regions.

Once again, Euroalert.net is going to be at the Open Days 2011, the most important annual event for European regions

2011-10-04T19:30:00.001+02:00

Next week, from 10 to 13 October, it is going to take place in Brussels the most important annual event for European regions and municipalities, the Open Days 2011. Of course, Euroalert is going to be there to attend as many workshops and activities as we can during those days. As we published in Euroalert last July, the week of the regions is dedicated on this occasion to 'Investing in Europe's future: Regions and cities delivering smart, sustainable and inclusive growth'. The Committee of the Regions and the European Commission, Directorate-General for Regional Policy, in partnership with regions and cities from all over Europe, are organizing this important event in which more than 6,000 professionals will share experiences, information and best practices through about 100 workshops launched for the occasion.

And of course, Euroalert is going to have an active presence in the Open Days 2011. Euroalert team is covering the event on 'live' via Twitter and also with the regular publication of news. Among the workshops to be covered, Euroalert is going to attend one in which the Committee of the Regions' initiative 'Entrepreneurial Region of Europe' and the 'Small Business Act' are going to be explained. Also Euroalert is attending to the 'Financial Instruments enhancing access to RDI for companies to achieve Europe 2020 Flagship Initiative' workshop, in order to keep informed our readers on this topic. As you know, Euroalert provides information on the latest EU call for proposals opened and EU funding instruments is a very relevant topic to the Euroalert community.

These workshops and many others will be followed on live by Euroalert team. In addition to our Twitter and news coverage, we will tell you our experience on the Open Days 2011 through this blog, as we did in October 2010 and also in October 2009. If you are taking part at the Open Days 2011 in Brussels and you want to contact us so we can attend your event or you'd like to talk about Euroalert products and services, you can always send us a direct message via Twitter or drop us an e-mail. In all the cases, we hope to provide as much information on what's happening during the Open Days 2011 as we can. And live! See you at the biggest event for regions!

10ders Alerts provides tender data in a reusable format

2011-09-14T09:01:00.000+02:00

A couple of months ago we announced you the launch of the promotional free trial period for our alerting service on public tenders: 10ders Alerts. Since then, frequent improvements have been made not only in the 10ders Alerts interface, but also in the sources of information which are aggregated in order to provide a more comprehensive database of European public contracts. We have also added new data from tender announcement such as those provided by Open Data Euskadi, and improved the criteria that can be used to describe any company's products and services in a profile that will allow them to get the most relevant information on public tenders for their activity.

Since the launch of 10ders Alerts in January 2011, hundreds of companies from almost all European Union countries and even from outside the EU, have used the free trial period to evaluate the quality of service. Thanks to their suggestions, 10ders Alerts has improved its functionality. One of the most popular requests coming from users, which is referred to 10ders Alerts, was that the data provided by the alert system should be delivered in reusable formats - an essential characteristic of our service, given the intense activity of Euroalert within the Open Data movement.

Following that request, a new feature has been released this week: the possibility for companies to obtain relevant data from public tenders in a reusable format according to their product profile. This can be done by any subscriber simply by changing the delivery options in the 10ders Alerts dashboard:

Let's remember that Euroalert services for corporate clients already provide contents in different reusable formats which allow, e.g., the publication on other websites. However, subscribers to the alerting service in public tenders are typically end users and, therefore, their approach should be different. Besides, as this service is mainly used by people whose usual working tools are the most common office packages, we chose Microsoft Excel as the format for providing tender alerts' contents by email.

If you are interested in testing this service for free, you only need to apply for it by sending us an email to TenderAlerts@euroalert.net, and we will provide you with the necessary assistance to opt-in.

The price of this new service is 45 euros/month (432 euros/year) although all new subscriptions as well as current customers will benefit until the end of the year of a reduced price of 20 euros/month (192 euros/year). We hope this new service which complements Euroalert intelligence products on public markets, will help all companies in the Euroalert community to improve their performance in public markets.

Euroalert presented as European Open Data initiative at the Digital Agenda Assembly

2011-06-23T18:22:00.001+02:00

Last June 16th, we had the honour to make a presentation on Euroalert as leading Open Data company at European level in the Assembly of the Digital Agenda. As you know the European Digital Agenda 2020 is the EU strategy for the development of the digital economy in Europe, so the opportunity to make this presentation has been a great recognition of our work.
May and June, both months, have been very intense for Euroalert with regard to its participation in events in relation to Open Data. After participating in the Share-PSI seminar and the annual meeting of the Aporta project in Madrid, our participation to the Open Data workshop at the Digital Agenda Assembly has been a great culmination.
We are also excited to see how the Open Data community is keeping growing and it continues to arouse a great interest. The Open Data workshop was one of those who attracted more public and sparked more conversation on Twitter. The importance of the Open Data was also shown by the Open Data and Hack4Europe Challenge! competitions which awards were given at the Digital Agenda Assembly too by Neelie Kroes, Commission vice-president.
For those who could not attend or watch the event streamed, the Digital Agenda website put to your disposal all the presentations. We want to provide you here an extended version of the slides used to present Euroalert:Building a pan-European platform to aggregate public procurement data and deliver commercial services for SMEs powered by open data

We are very proud to have been part of this great event and we take this opportunity to thank you for your support. You are part of the Euroalert success in having the best information services with regard to the EU procurement services. From our side, we keep working hard for providing you the best service.

Euroalert will speak at the Digital Agenda Assembly

2011-06-13T22:56:00.005+02:00

We are glad to share with you that Euroalert.net will be one of the speakers at the 1st Digital Agenda Assembly. We have been selected as a showcase of a European Open Data initiative to present our experience as a business that reuses EU daily contents and public contracts information. In particular, Euroalert will present at workshop nº 1: "Open data and re-use of public sector information".

Our director José Luis Marin will explain Euroalert experience in building the 10ders Information Services platform. With this platform, Euroalert intends to aggregate public procurement data from all over the EU and deliver added-value services primarily to SMEs.

We want to thank the European Commission for the opportunity that offers to Euroalert with this invitation. The workshop in which Euroalert participates, Open data and re-use of public sector information (hashtag #daa11psi), will take place on the 16th of June from 10h to 13h30 and will be streamed for those of you who will not be able to attend. If you want to have more information on the Euroalert participation, you can contact us via Twitter or by mail. See you in Brussels.

Euroalert will participate at the Aporta Project annual meeting on the Open Data initiatives in Spain: Challenges and Solutions

2011-06-07T14:24:00.004+02:00

The meeting organized by the Aporta Project will take place on next Thursday 9 June in Madrid, just a year after of the last PSI Meeting 2010, which brought together European Open Data community with a great success. As occurred last year, Euroalert has been kindly invited to describe its business model which is based in the service that offers EU daily information adding value to the public sector information, such as calls for proposals to finance projects, the European legislation, daily European news and public tenders. Euroalert is glad to accept the invitation and it will attend to the event in order to support with its presence the advancement of Open Data culture in Spain.

The meeting will focus to the newest policies on PSI re-use, legal aspects of opening up public data, technical challenges on the way to open data, new business initiatives and new channels of participation and communication between authorities, entrepreneurs and citizens. Our director, Jose Luis Marin, will participate speaking on the Euroalert.net experience from 4 pm in the roundtable nº4, which focus on the "New business initiatives based on PSI reuse. What actions and measures can be promoted by governments to create the right conditions for innovation and new business based on PSI reuse? What economic value has the reuse of PSI?".

Of course, in the event's program there is detailed information on the topics to be discussed in the rest of the five interesting roundtables and the speakers who will take place in them. In addition, the event will be another opportunity to exchange views with the members of the Spanish Open Data community. Although registration is now closed, you can follow the event through Twitter, following the hashtag #SpainESdata and via streaming.

Euroalert wants to remind you that we will be from 8:30 am at the Auditorium of the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade. C/ Capitan Haya, 41 - 28071 - Madrid. If you want to meet us in person, you can always contact us via Twitter or by mail. Moreover, it will be a great opportunity in order to prepare Euroalert's participation at the 1st Digital Agenda Assembly in Brussels next week. Keep posting to this blog for further information on this event.

Presenting Euroalert at the workshop Share PSI prior to the Digital Agenda Assembly

2011-05-17T23:49:00.009+02:00

As previously announced, Euroalert participated on 9 of May with many members of the European Open Data community at the workshop “Removing Road Blocks to a Pan European Market for PSI Reuse”, organized by the initiative W3C and ETSI: SharePSI.

Our position paper, 'Euroalert.net: Building a pan-European public procurement platform to aggregate data and commercial services for SMEs Deliver powered by open data' was selected to be presented, along with other interesting examples of services feeded by public sector information, on the table "Use Cases I" moderated by Margot Dor from ETSI.

In our intervention, we explained Euroalert experience in building the 10ders Information Services platform, throughout reusing public information data. With this platform, we intend to add data procurement from all over the EU and of course, the added-value services that we provide primarily to SMEs based on tender data.

10ders IS is a simple idea but at the same time it supposes a challenge as EU public procurement represents about 18% of the aggregate GDP of all member countries.

Of course, we try to contribute to the workshop explaining the obstacles that we are finding at every step, but also the satisfaction that is providing services to organizations and companies from 15 different countries. Especially considering that we are still at the beginning of our way and therefore we have a long way to create services and information to process.

As usually, we put at your disposal the presentation used in the workshop and we recommend you visiting the excellent collection of resources on the sessions that ETSI platform has conducted, and the article that our director has posted on his blog with a summary of his impressions.

Building a pan-European platform to aggregate public procurement data and deliver commercial services for SMEs powered by open data

We will continue working hard in order to provide you the best information services and that Euroalert keeps be considered a leading company in the emerging market for information-based services in the public sector, a company powered by OpenData. Thank you all for helping us getting there.

Euroalert will present 10ders Information Services at the workshop "Share-PSI.eu" within the framework of the European Digital Agenda

2011-05-04T10:14:00.004+02:00

The first workshop, “Share-PSI”, will be held in Brussels on the 10-11 of May and is organized in the framework of the “Big Idea” of the European Digital Agenda. This event brings together different actors who are related to the reuse of public sector information (PSI) and who will discuss and contribute with ideas on how to re-use "open data" of public administration. Among them, they are representatives of civil society, media, government organizations, representatives of academia and companies like Euroalert.

On behalf of Euroalert.net, our director will participate at the workshop in the round table on the presentation of case studies which demonstrates the potential of “Open Data”, i.e. the reuse of public information. As a case study, José Luis Marin, will presents the position paper: "Euroalert.net: Building a pan-European platform to aggregate public procurement data and deliver commercial services for SMEs powered by open data”.

As you already might know, Euroalert create value from these "open data" offering the best content daily information about the European Union, such as calls for projects, news and EU legislation. Although in this occasion, it is our project 10ders Information Services, which is aimed to build a pan-European platform that will aggregate the big data about public procurement information generated by hundreds of thousands of contracting authorities in the EU, which leads us to Brussels along with other relevant actors in the European Open Data Community. You can also take a look to some of our services based in 10ders IS in the Euroalert store online, as well as the alerts systems on Government contracts for SMEs or the 10ders Reports.

If you have time, we recommend you to attend to this event because there will be presented many interesting ideas. Euroalert will participate on May 10 and we will try to keep you informed of everything that happens through our Twitter. We would also like to remind you that you can take the opportunity to meet us and if you wish some more information about our services you can always send us an e-mail. Of course, you will find in our blog a complete summary of what happened in this event afterwards. Thus, keep reading Euroalert's blog.

Euroalert.net meets International Trade at IMEX 2011

2011-05-02T00:22:00.002+02:00

Among the activities our Team has prepared for this month, for whom we will give you some more details in the coming days, Euroalert.net will be on May 11th at the Madrid «Fair for International Business and Investment IMEX 2011», one more opportunity for us to meet institutions and businesses who develop their activity in the field of International Trade.

As you already know Euroalert.net has taken the challenge to build up the most complete pan-European platform aggregating information on all public contracts in the European Union which will help us to provide value services for SMEs. Our services and tools on EU Government contracts information are already being used by institutions and companies in many countries in order to improve their results in the public procurement sector outside their home countries, developing their export strategies and Internationalization Plans.

Among the institutions who already trust Euroalert.net to help their companies to export their products and services to foreign countries, there are organizations such as the Irish Trade and Technology Agency Enterprise Ireland, the London Chamber of Commerce or the Export or the International Promotion Agency for Spanish Madrid region PromoMadrid.

We are sure that this will be a perfect occasion for us to meet institutions and companies willing to improve their market intelligence focused in export activities thanks to Euroalert.net information products and services.

If you are in Madrid in May 11th and have the opportunity to stop in IMEX 2011, you can contact us either by e-mail or via Twitter as the Head of Euroalert.net International Department, Mai Rodriguez Entem, will be there all that day and will be pleased to meet you and chat about how Euroalert.net can help you to export.

IMEX 2011 will also run on May 12th, so if you are close to Madrid Municipal Conference Centre, don't forget: you have an appointment with International Trade!

Euroalert experience at the Open Data networking session at SICARM

2011-04-19T16:30:00.010+02:00

SICARM 2011 event held in Murcia, closed last Friday with a session on Open Data: "The commercial reuse of public sector information: a new business opportunity for companies and funding opportunity for government against the crisis?”.

As we anticipated last week, Euroalert participated in this session, explaining its experience regarding reusing data administrations, both good and bad, and also showing some examples of the services Euroalert provide to companies and organizations throughout Europe.

We had a very interesting morning because we all learned many things about different aspects involved in the reuse of public sector information. Jose Manuel Alonso from CTIC Foundation, and professors Emilio Guichot Reina and Manuel Fernández Salmerón provided interesting information from the different angles of their respective areas of expertise. In order to know of what we are talking about, you can have a look to the Euroalert presentation paper, as well as CTIC Foundation presentation which explains the current state of play with regard to Open Data and the roundtable on the videos posted on the SICARM website.

Information Services Based on Reuse of Public Sector Information

Also, you can find more details regarding this event on the Jose L. Marín blog. We want to thank to everyone who came to the University of Murcia for its presence and to those who followed it through the Internet or Twitter.

Euroalert will participate in “SICARM 2011” event at Murcia Region

2011-04-12T13:10:00.004+02:00

Euroalert.net keeps participating on events in which we can share experiences and learning to improve and to offer a better service. This week, we will travel to Murcia (Spain). There, it takes place the “XI Foro Anual Sociedad Información” «Information Society XI Annual Forum» and our director, José Luis Marín, will be one of the speakers in one of the panels in which he will describe how Euroalert uses opendata to offer more and better commercial intelligence services to companies from all over Europe adding an extra value to the information from the public sector.

«Information Society XI Annual Forum» has as its theme this year «The legal challenges of technological innovation in public administration». These workshops aim to "explore the legal implications of process innovation and openness that is demanded to the Public Administration by the society, so that satisfactorily meet the constitutional mandate to serve the general interest in accordance with the requirements and possibilities that technology offers to give effect to the principles of effectiveness, efficiency and participation because it has not yet been raised in an open debate about the enormous possibilities of modernization and, above all, innovation enabling tools available today".

There will also be in SICARM 2011, other great speakers, experts in the reuse of public sector information, as are many of the players in the Open Data community in Spain. These are some of the participants in this Forum, which we will have the honor to share the event:

Fernando de Pablo, General Director for the Promotion of Electronic Administration of the Ministry of the Presidency. he called his speech: "Is it possible a new model of public administration based on innovation and technology?"
Lorenzo Cotino Hueso, Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Valencia and Coordinator for ICT Network Law. His presentation will focus on "Legal and institutional problems of the Open Government".
José Manuel Alonso, from the CTIC Foundation who will speak on "The reuse of the public information in Spain: current status and future prospects" and that will be in our same workshop.

In addition, there will be many other speakers that may be of interest for your activities so we recommend you to review the complete program of SICARM 2011.

If you are interested in learning more about this topic and you are in Murcia between 13 and 15 April, you can still register using this form. Moreover, registration is free. In concrete, presentations and workshops will be held in the Auditorium and Congress Centre of Murcia, 13 and 14 April and 15 April at the University of Murcia, Campus La Merced. Euroalert will participate on April 15 so if you want to meet us in person or more details on any of Euroalert's services do not hesitate to send us a mail or send us a DM via Twitter. See you there!

Euroalert.net lends an Ear to Europe!

2011-03-21T13:20:00.001+01:00

Over the past nearly 4 years, Euroalert.net Official Blog has been one of the channels where we have been telling you all the news and developments related to our business and services, which go beyond the daily track of EU news and activities. It has also been the way for you to give us your feedback about these changes, which has been indeed of quite a help for us. It is easy to follow Euroalert.net's evolution over this time in its Blog, as it has been the channel to announce new features in our services – widgets, public procurement and government contracts alerting services, on-line store, etc.; the launch of new sections with more contents in our web – such as EU Law, or commercial opportunities and public procurement in multilateral organizations, etc.; Euroalert.net's mentions in the press, or Euroalert.net's participation in open data events where we have been contributing with our experiences in re-using public sector information.

However, no announcement has made us more excited as the one we are bringing you today: Macarena Rodríguez, from La Oreja de Europa, will join us as new Euroalert.net Editor in Chief from 1 April!

As Macarena needs no introduction among all followers of European Union matters, let us just tell you that she is coming with a bag full of new projects and new energy to bring you every day all the most relevant contents about the day-to-day activity of the European Union and its institutions.

We are sure that her contribution to Euroalert.net's Team will make it an even more useful site for all of you, and will also allow us to move faster in our goal to build the first pan-European platform to aggregate public procurement and tenders from the 27 Member States in the European Union.

La Oreja de Europa ("Europe's Ear") will of course keep on listening to Europe, and will not disappear or be part of Euroalert.net corporation. It will remain a personal project run by Macarena Rodríguez, who will keep on devoting as much effort as before to create a space for reflection and opinion on EU issues. Euroalert.net, will of course be very happy it remains so.

Welcome to Euroalert.net Team, Macarena!

Euroalert.net has a brand new look!

2011-03-15T10:13:00.004+01:00

Throughout the last weekend we have been publishing the new versions of the different websites which make Euroalert.net. The main change you will perceive is the new look of all sections of Euroalert.net, whose main objective is to improve the overall clarity in the presentation of these contents.

We really hope you will like these changes but, above all, what we really hope to have achieved is our goal to improve the presentation and allow you to better read the contents on the most relevant news about the European Union that we publish every day. As always, your feedback is very much appreciated, so send us all your comments and opinions through Euroalert.net twitter channel!

A few weeks ago we already announced the launch of a new Public procurement alerting service, a service that you can also try and test for your business thanks to the 7-day free trial you can get by registering in Euroalert.net website. This alerting system is one of the services that will make up the wide range of products and services Euroalert.net will be launching during 2011 as part or its strategy to become the first pan-European platform to aggregate all public tenders and public procurement contracts in the European Union.

Following this same trend to create business services based on public sector information, Euroalert.net has also launched over the last months the service to provide customized newsletters on European information, as well as the new section on European Union legislation, where for the moment you will find the legal provisions published in the L Series of the OJEU, but that will be expanded very soon.

In the coming weeks you will be noticing more changes as more new features will be added in order to improve the content we offer you every day as well as the services we provide based on this information. But, before anything else, we will be making the announcement you are all waiting for, the name of the person who will be the new Euroalert.net Chief Editor from 1 April...