cross-border bidding local partner teaming eu procurement professional qualifications

Bidding abroad: how to find and choose a local partner for a public tender

TenderDesk · 29 Oct 2026 · 25 min read

When an architecture practice bidding in another EU country needs a local partner and when it does not, how to find one through award notices, competition results and chamber registers, how to check it, and what to agree before you submit.

An architecture practice established in one EU country can bid for public work in any other without a local partner. Buyers must accept your home-country registration, and EU law lets an architect work temporarily in another member state after a simple declaration to the host authority. You need a local partner when the tender or the contract asks for something you cannot supply yourself: a submission in a language you do not write well, references the selection panel will trust, signing rights and site presence for the permit and construction stages, and working knowledge of local codes, planning and costs. Find partners through award notices, competition results and chamber registers, check them against the tender's selection criteria, and sign a short cooperation agreement before you submit.

Few practices do this. A 2023 survey by the German Federal Chamber of Architects found that only 4 percent of EU-wide planning procedures in Germany received a single application from abroad (see architecture tenders in Germany). The barriers are language, references, signing rights and the cost of learning a new system: the gaps a local partner fills.

This guide covers the cross-border side of teaming. The legal structures and the liability rules by country are in lead firm, consortium or subcontracting; choosing structural, MEP and cost partners, with a scorecard and a worked fee split, is in how to choose an engineering partner.

Key points

You can bid without a local entity. A buyer may not reject you because its own law would require a different legal form (Directive 2014/24/EU, Article 19(1)), and it may ask only for enrolment in a professional register of the country where you are established (Article 58(2)).
To practise temporarily in another member state, an architect may have to file a written declaration with the host authority before the first service, renewed once a year (Directive 2005/36/EC, Article 7). Architects with a qualification listed in Annex V.7 of that directive are recognised automatically.
Registration is a condition for performing and signing, not usually for applying. In France the declaration goes to the regional council of the Ordre des architectes; in Germany to the chamber of the state where you work; in Finland designers in regulated roles have needed a certificate of qualifications since January 2025.
The language is set by the tender documents, and most buyers use their own. France's procurement code lets buyers require French translations of what you submit.
The later phases are where a local partner earns its share. In the German HOAI, phases 5 to 8 (execution planning, tender and site supervision) carry 71 percent of the fee for a building.
Public data shows who wins what: award and design-contest result notices on TED and national portals, competition results published by chambers and associations, and chamber registers.
Check a partner against the tender: registration, insurance valid in the host country, turnover and references against the selection criteria, capacity, and conflicts such as prior involvement in preparing the brief.
Agree exclusivity, scope by phase, fee split, liability, authorship, governing law and what happens if you lose or win, in writing, before submission.

Do you need a local partner?

What EU law already gives you

Two directives set the floor. Directive 2014/24/EU governs the bid. Article 19(1) says an operator entitled to provide a service where it is established may not be rejected solely because the host country's law would require it to be a natural or a legal person. Article 58(2) lets the buyer ask for enrolment in a professional or trade register "in their Member State of establishment", or for proof of an authorisation or membership needed to provide the service at home. The Court of Justice applied the same logic in Sotsiaalministeerium (C-6/20, 20 May 2021), decided under the 2004 directive: a buyer could not require, as a selection criterion, an approval from its own country from a tenderer that already held a similar one at home.

Directive 2005/36/EC governs the work. Its Title II covers the temporary and occasional provision of services:

The host country may not restrict a provider legally established in another member state for reasons relating to professional qualifications (Article 5). Whether it is temporary is assessed case by case: duration, frequency, regularity, continuity.
It must exempt you from registration with or membership of its professional body, though it may provide for automatic temporary registration or pro forma membership, as long as this does not delay or complicate the service or cost you anything extra (Article 6).
It may require a written declaration before the first service, renewed once a year, with details of your professional liability insurance, proof of nationality, an attestation that you are legally established and not prohibited from practising, and evidence of your qualifications (Article 7(1) and (2)).
For architects whose qualification is listed in Annex V.7, recognition is automatic, no prior check applies, and the service is provided under the host country's professional title (Article 7(3) and (4)).
You remain subject to the host country's professional rules on matters such as the use of titles and serious professional malpractice (Article 5(3)).

If you open an office and work in the country on a continuing basis, you are no longer providing a temporary service but establishing, and the host chamber's full registration rules apply.

What the host country adds

The declaration is the easy part. What differs is what each country reserves to registered architects, who may sign the permit application, and what the buyer expects to read.

Country	Title and reserved work	Temporary-service route	Watch for
France	Title protected; anyone applying for a building permit must use an architect to draw up the architectural project, with exceptions for small private projects (Law 77-2 of 1977, Articles 3 and 4)	Written declaration to the regional council of the Ordre where the first service is planned, renewed yearly, with insurance under French law (Article 10-1); the council decides within one month of a complete file	Professional liability insurance (Article 16) and ten-year construction cover (Insurance Code, Article L241-1); buyers can require French for candidatures and offers, and the contract is in French
Germany	Title protected by the sixteen state architects' acts; only a bauvorlageberechtigt designer may sign the building application	Notification to the chamber of the state where you work, which lists you as a visiting service provider; in North Rhine-Westphalia the fee is €200 and the decision comes within three months	German in practice for applications, negotiation and correspondence; scope and fee described in HOAI phases
Netherlands	The titles architect, urban designer, landscape architect and interior architect are protected through the Architectenregister	EEA and Swiss architects can be registered for the duration of their work by contacting the register	Language and qualification requirements set in each tender
Portugal	Profession regulated by the Ordem dos Arquitectos	Occasional and sporadic practice under Law 9/2009 with a declaration; automatically recognised architects may use the title arquiteto (Statute of the Ordem, Article 7)	Language set in the programa do procedimento, normally Portuguese
Finland	Since the Construction Act took effect on 1 January 2025, designers in regulated roles need a certificate of qualifications (Act 812/2023) at the level of the project's difficulty	SAFA issues certificates for regular design tasks and checks the equivalence of foreign qualifications; higher levels go through FISE	Permit and site work in Finnish or Swedish; international competitions often also accept English
Denmark, Sweden, Norway	Title of architect not protected	No declaration needed for the title	Qualification requirements are whatever the tender asks; codes and permit routes are national

So you can apply on your home registration, but have your declaration or notification in place before you start performing. And even where no registration is needed, the codes, the permit route and the buyer's working language are national, which is where a partner is worth its fee.

When you need one, and when you don't

You probably need a local partner when:

You cannot write the submission language at a professional level. A panel reads your method statement as evidence of how you will run its meetings for years.
Selection scores references the panel can check. Foreign references count in law, but a German authority judging "comparable" planning requirements, or a French jury shortlisting a handful of teams from dozens, will trust a project it can visit and a client it can call.
The contract runs through permit, tender and site supervision. France's mission de base for a new public building runs from sketch to handover, including site supervision (DET), and is the minimum public owners must commission. German commissions normally run through phase 8. Weekly site meetings in the host language are not a job for a fly-in team.
Local codes and costs drive the design. Fire safety, accessibility, energy rules, planning documents and cost benchmarks are national or regional, and a cost plan built on home-country rates will be noticed.

You may not need one when:

It is an open, anonymous competition whose first stage asks only for a design in a language you can manage. Line up the partner before the negotiation that follows a win.
The commission stops at design, such as a masterplan, a feasibility study or a preliminary design handed to another team.
You are already established in the country, with registered architects, native speakers and local references.
You are the specialist. A buyer looking for heritage, healthcare or laboratory expertise may want your references more than local presence, and you may join a local lead rather than the reverse.

What each side brings, and what each side wants

A partnership works when both firms get something they could not get alone. Say so early: most disputes come from unvoiced assumptions.

	Foreign practice	Local practice
Brings	Design reputation, specialist references, a fresh approach, capacity in the early design phases, sometimes digital methods the local market lacks	Registration and signing rights, language, codes, planning and permit routes, local cost data and contractors, site presence, references the buyer recognises, relationships with clients and authorities
Wants	A new market, a credible delivery partner, a reference for the next bid, control of the design	Larger or more prestigious commissions than its own references would win, real design credit, a fair share of the fee, early involvement, further bids together, protection from being dropped after the award

The foreign firm's commonest mistake is to treat the local partner as a stamp. The law sees through it: under Article 63 of the procurement directive you can rely on another firm's experience or qualifications only if that firm performs the services concerned. The local firm's commonest mistake is to accept a share that looks fair for the design phases and then find it is carrying most of the hours.

The roles a local partner can play

Four arrangements cover most cross-border teams. Each maps to a structure in lead firm, consortium or subcontracting.

Role	What the local partner does	Usual structure	Watch out for
Co-author	Designs with you from the first sketch; both firms are named authors	Group of operators with joint liability	How design decisions are made; credit in publications
Delivery architect (the German Kontaktarchitekt)	Takes over from permit or execution design to handover and runs site supervision	Group member, or subcontractor to the foreign lead	A fee share that follows the hours; your design control during execution
Local adviser	Codes, permits, cost checks, translation review; no signing role	Subcontractor	Its references do not carry your selection unless it performs the related work
Local lead with a foreign design architect	Bids and signs; you are design consultant	Local firm leads; you subcontract or lend capacity	Your authorship and say in design development

The weight of the phases explains why delivery is rarely a junior role. Section 34 of the German HOAI splits the basic services for a building into 2 percent for basic evaluation, 7 for preliminary design, 15 for design, 3 for the permit application, 25 for execution planning, 10 for tender preparation, 4 for the tender, 32 for site supervision and 2 for aftercare. A foreign practice leading phases 1 to 3 does 24 percent of the fee scale; a partner taking phases 5 to 8 does 71 percent. Other countries divide the work differently, but construction stages are heavy everywhere, and need local people.

Where to find partners using public information

The best partner is one you have already delivered with. Without one, use the public record of who wins what.

Award notices on TED and national portals

Above the EU thresholds (since 1 January 2026, €140,000 for central government services, €216,000 for other public buyers and €5,404,000 for works, under Delegated Regulation (EU) 2025/2152), contract awards must be published in TED within 30 days (Article 50 of the directive), and so must the results of design contests (Article 79). A result notice names the winning tenderer, usually with the other members when the winner is a group, together with the buyer, the subject, the value and often whether part of the contract will be subcontracted.

Search result notices in your target country with the architecture CPV codes (71200000 and its sub-codes, such as 71221000 for buildings and 71240000 for architecture, engineering and planning) and the building types you want. Within an hour you will know which practices win schools or libraries in the region and which engineers they win with. A practice that appears repeatedly in groups with foreign firms already knows how to team.

National sources add the work below the thresholds. France publishes the essential data of public contracts as open data on data.gouv.fr, Portugal's BASE portal publishes contracts with the contractor's name, and the national portals on each country page publish award notices. TenderDesk's feed gathers TED and national sources and scores the notices for design work, which makes the search quicker, but the notices themselves are public.

Competition results and exhibitions

Competitions show who designs well, not just who passes selection. In Germany each state chamber publishes the competitions it has registered, and under the RPW 2013 rules the entries are exhibited with the authors' names after the jury's decision. In the Nordic countries the associations are closely involved: SAFA in Finland advises organisers and keeps an archive of past competitions, the Danish association appoints professional jurors, the Norwegian association advises clients through its competition secretariat, and the Swedish association appoints architects to the juries of competitions run with it. Design-contest result notices in TED name the prize-winners of every contest above the threshold.

Prize-winners in your building type are the practices to approach: a local jury rewarded their designs, and many lack the completed references to win a negotiated procedure alone.

Registers of chambers of architects

Where the title is protected, chambers keep registers you can use to confirm that a person or firm is registered: the regional councils of the Ordre des architectes in France, the state chambers' lists in Germany, the Architectenregister in the Netherlands, the Ordem dos Arquitectos in Portugal. In Finland the bodies issuing designers' certificates must keep a register of valid certificates (Act 812/2023, section 10). The Architects' Council of Europe (ACE) keeps a databank of country profiles naming each country's member organisations, a quick way to find the right chamber in an unfamiliar market. A register confirms status, not quality: use it to check a name you found elsewhere.

Associations, events and your own network

Associations such as the BNA in the Netherlands, the BDA in Germany, SAFA, Sveriges Arkitekter, the Akademisk Arkitektforening and the NAL make practices visible through directories and awards, and chamber conferences, architecture days and competition exhibitions put you in a room with the firms that win locally. Your home country's trade agency can arrange introductions, and the EU's Enterprise Europe Network runs a free partnering database and matchmaking events through local contact points. Ask the engineers and clients you already work with which local architects they rate. And make yourself findable: the TenderDesk firms directory lists practices by country and discipline, so a local firm looking for a foreign design partner can find you too.

Due diligence: checking a partner before you commit

The buyer will check your partner, and in a group it will treat your partner's failure as yours. Run the checks against the tender in front of you. The general method and a scorecard are in the engineering partner guide; these are the points that change across a border.

Check	Where to verify	Red flag
Registration	The host chamber's register; the national company register	The architect who will sign is not registered, or the firm uses a protected title without the registered directors the law requires
Insurance	The insurer's certificate: limit per claim and in aggregate, territory, building types, expiry; in France the ten-year construction cover	Exclusions for joint ventures, foreign clients or the building type; cover below the tender's level
Turnover	Filed accounts against the tender's minimum, which may not exceed twice the contract value unless justified (Article 58(3))	Turnover only just at the threshold, or falling
References	Award notices on TED and the national portal; a call to the client	Projects the partner cannot show it designed or delivered; the Court of Justice's Esaprojekt ruling (C-387/14) bars claiming a consortium's experience without real involvement
Capacity	Named people, their other commitments, a staffing letter	A director's CV on the bid and a junior on the job
Exclusion grounds	The partner's own ESPD; national debarment registers where they exist	Unpaid taxes, insolvency, a terminated public contract it did not mention

Conflicts deserve their own step, because local partners are local precisely because they know the buyer:

Prior involvement. If the partner advised the buyer or helped prepare the procurement, for example by writing the feasibility study, the buyer must take measures to keep competition fair, such as sharing that information with all bidders, and may exclude the team only as a last resort, after giving it a chance to show that competition was not distorted (Articles 41 and 57(4)(f)). Ask every partner directly.
Links to the jury. Competition rules exclude people whose role in preparing the competition or whose ties to the jury could give them an advantage. The German RPW 2013 (section 4(2)) extends this to relatives and economically connected persons; in Finnish competitions jury members, their experts, the jury secretary and people linked to the brief cannot take part.
Other teams. A local practice in demand may be approached by several foreign firms for the same procedure. French buyers may bar a firm from appearing in more than one group, and Portuguese procedures prohibit it for group members; even where it is allowed, you need to know.
Competition law. Two architecture practices that could each have bid alone may have to explain why they teamed; see lead firm, consortium or subcontracting.

Then meet the people. A two-hour working session on the actual brief, in the host language, tells you more than any website about how the partner thinks and whether your teams can work together.

The cooperation agreement

Sign it before submission; two signed pages beat thirty unsigned ones. The general clause list is in the engineering partner guide. A cross-border agreement needs these points in particular:

Roles and who leads. Who represents the group (mandataire, federführendes Mitglied, penvoerder), who signs, who submits and who speaks to the buyer. Name the design author and the delivery lead separately if they differ.
Exclusivity. For this procedure at least. Add non-circumvention both ways: the local firm does not join a competing foreign team, and the foreign firm does not replace the local partner after the award without cause.
Scope by phase, in the host country's vocabulary. HOAI phases in Germany, the mission de base elements in France, the stages the tender uses elsewhere, with a responsibility matrix.
A fee split that follows the work. By phase and by hours, not one percentage agreed over lunch. Say how negotiation cuts, extras and variations are shared and when each firm is paid.
Liability and insurance. Internal allocation, cross-indemnities for each firm's own scope, minimum cover, and whether you buy a project policy. Check each policy covers work in the host country under its law.
Authorship. Who is named as author in the entry, the press and the building's credits, who may use the drawings and images in later bids, and that moral rights follow the law where the building stands. Design credit is often what the local partner values most.
If you lose. Each firm usually bears its own bid costs. Agree how prize money or a participant fee (prime, Bearbeitungshonorar) is split, and that neither firm reuses the joint design without the other's consent.
If you win. The steps and dates for turning the agreement into the contract-stage arrangement or legal form the buyer requires, who files which declarations, and the staffing plan for the first phase.
Exit and replacement. Insolvency, loss of registration or insurance, a key person leaving. The buyer must approve changes, so agree who finds a replacement and at whose cost.
Language, law and disputes. The language of the agreement and which version prevails; the governing law, which the parties may choose under the Rome I Regulation (Article 3); the court or arbitration for disputes; and an escalation route before either.
Tax and staff. Architects' plans for a building on a specific plot are taxed where the property is located (Article 47 of the VAT Directive; Article 31a(2)(a) of Implementing Regulation 282/2011), so ask an adviser whether the foreign firm must register for VAT in the host country. Staff sent to work there need an A1 certificate to stay in the home social security system, and many host countries require a posting declaration first.

Working together across languages and time zones

Inside Europe time zones are the easy part: Lisbon and Helsinki are two hours apart. Language, conventions and calendars are harder.

Separate the working language from the submission language. Teams often work in English and submit in the host language. One native speaker owns the final text and reads every page, forms included. Machine translation is a draft, never a submission.
Build a glossary on day one. Phase names, cost categories, room names, area definitions: Germany measures to DIN 277, the Netherlands to NEN 2580, French planning uses surface de plancher. A misread area table costs points.
Present in the buyer's language. Give the local partner a speaking role at the interview or the German Verhandlung, and use a professional interpreter if your design lead presents in another language.
Agree the digital set-up early: file formats, a shared data environment, naming standards, the tender's BIM requirements and who owns the model.
Put the calendars in the programme. Regional holidays, the August slowdown in France and Italy and the Nordic July holidays all hit deadlines.
Plan the site years now. Who attends site meetings, in which language minutes are written, who signs instructions to the contractor. That answer drives the fee split.

Three scenarios

A Portuguese practice in a French design competition

A 15-person practice in Porto with two completed schools wants to enter a concours restreint for a new secondary school held by a French département. The notice is in the BOAMP and TED, and the candidature asks for an architect-led team with engineers and a cost consultant, recent references and a French-language application.

The practice could apply on its Portuguese registration: the buyer may ask only for enrolment in the register of the country of establishment, and if its architects' degrees are listed in Annex V.7, recognition in France is automatic. But it would have to file a declaration with the regional council of the Ordre before performing, insure its liability under French law, including ten-year construction cover, and deliver a mission de base that includes site supervision, in French, until handover. And it has no French references, which a jury shortlisting a handful of teams will look for.

It teams with a 20-person practice in the region that has delivered two collèges. They form a groupement with the French firm as mandataire, so the client deals with a firm it knows, and the Porto practice as co-author of the design. The French firm leads the permit, tender and site stages, with French engineers and économiste. The fee split follows the mission elements, roughly balanced through design and weighted to the French firm from the tender stage onwards. The Porto practice files its declaration as soon as the team is shortlisted, so it can sign the design stages in its own name.

A Dutch practice in a German negotiated procedure

A Rotterdam practice wants to bid for a comprehensive school in North Rhine-Westphalia, procured through a VgV negotiated procedure with a call for applications. The application is in German; selection asks for three references with comparable planning requirements, professional liability insurance and a minimum turnover; the negotiation covers a fee in HOAI terms and a presentation.

The practice has strong school references and passes on turnover, but has no German-speaking project leader, has never priced in HOAI phases, and would need either its own notification to the state chamber or a partner entitled to sign the building application.

It forms a Bietergemeinschaft with a 12-person office in Düsseldorf that has public-sector experience but no large school. The Dutch firm leads design through phase 3 and the presentation; the German firm leads the permit application and phases 5 to 8. Because those phases carry 71 percent of the HOAI fee scale, the German partner takes the larger share of the fee, and the agreement gives the Dutch firm a defined role in design quality control during execution, so the building that is built is the one that was presented. Each member files its own EEE (Germany's ESPD), and both are usually jointly liable as partners in a civil-law partnership. Where a brief asks for references in the same building use, the team asks a written question before the deadline citing section 75(5) VgV, which says the same use is as a rule irrelevant.

An Italian practice in a Finnish open competition

A Milan practice sees an open international architectural competition in Finland organised with SAFA. The notice accepts submissions in Finnish and English, as the University of Oulu's 2026 campus competition does, and the first stage is anonymous: the jury sees only the design.

No partner is needed to enter. The question is what happens after a win. The commission will run under the Construction Act, in force since January 2025, and designers in regulated roles, including the principal designer, need certificates of qualifications at the level of the project's difficulty. SAFA can check the equivalence of an Italian degree and certify it for regular design tasks, but a large public building is likely to be classed higher, which requires relevant experience and a certificate through FISE. The permit process, the authority meetings and the site will run in Finnish.

So the practice enters alone, but during the competition period approaches two or three Finnish offices with a short conditional agreement: if the entry reaches the second stage or wins, the Finnish partner joins as delivery architect and principal designer, with an agreed share of the follow-on fee and credit as co-architect. It picks a firm that has itself been placed in recent competitions, from the results SAFA publishes, and checks that it holds the right certificate and has no link to the jury.

Mistakes to avoid

Choosing a partner by name before reading the selection criteria. Map each criterion to the firm that meets it, then look for the partner who fills the gaps.
Using the partner as a stamp. Borrowed references count only if the partner does the related work, and juries recognise a token local name.
Filing the declaration late. It is due before the first service, and the French council can take a month after the file is complete. File when you are shortlisted.
Assuming your home insurance travels. Check the territory, the host country's legal requirements and, in France, ten-year construction cover.
Splitting the fee by prestige rather than hours. The later phases carry most of the fee and the work.
Missing a partner's conflict: a feasibility study for the same buyer, a tie to a juror, a seat on another team.
Submitting a translation no native speaker has read, forms included.
Leaving authorship and the win vague. Settle credits, who signs and who supervises the site before the jury decides.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to register with the host country's chamber before I bid?

Usually not. A buyer may ask for enrolment in a professional register of the country where you are established (Article 58(2) of Directive 2014/24/EU) and must accept your home registration. You need the host-country declaration or registration before you perform the service and, where the law reserves it to architects, before you sign the permit application. Read the tender documents, because some ask for it at award.

Can a foreign architect sign a building permit application?

Yes, once entitled to practise in the host country. In France an EU architect who has filed a declaration under Article 10-1 of the 1977 Architecture Act may practise without being on the regional roll. In Germany the state building codes, for example section 67 of North Rhine-Westphalia's, allow EU providers who have notified the chamber to sign. In Finland the designer needs a certificate of qualifications at the right level. Otherwise a registered local partner signs.

In which language must I submit?

In the language or languages the notice and tender documents specify. Most national buyers use their own; some accept English too, especially in international competitions. France's procurement code lets buyers require French translations of documents in other languages, and the contract itself must be in French.

Should the local partner lead the bid, or should we?

Lead if the buyer is scoring your design and your references carry selection. Let the local partner lead if the buyer will choose on local track record and wants a contact it knows, and protect your authorship in the agreement. The choice between a group and subcontracting is explained in lead firm, consortium or subcontracting.

What if my partner helped the buyer prepare the project?

Tell the buyer. Under Article 41 of Directive 2014/24/EU the buyer must take measures to keep competition fair, such as sharing the information with all bidders, and can exclude the team only as a last resort, after giving it a chance to show that competition was not distorted. Hiding it is far riskier than disclosing it.