Senedd Business Management System

The Welsh Parliament (Senedd Cymru) is undertaking preliminary market engagement to inform the potential future procurement of a fully bilingual (English and Welsh) business management system. The potential contract will consist of the supply, implementation and ongoing support & development of the system.

The Senedd’s current Business Management System (SBMS), delivered using Civica’s Modern.gov platform, underpins the day-to-day management of all Senedd Business and a wide range of corporate meetings. It provides a central repository for meeting-related information, including agendas, papers and outcomes, and acts as a long-term archive.

The system is tightly integrated with the Senedd’s wider digital ecosystem, including the public website and Senedd TV, and acts as a core data source for multiple internal and public-facing services.SBMS is a high-profile system that plays a key role in managing information and making it publicly and privately available. It is a system used by Members and their staff, Commission staff, Independent Advisors and independent office holders (Remuneration Board, Standards Commissioner) and the people of Wales.

As a public-facing system that interacts with a number of other Senedd systems, this is deemed a business-critical system. Our use of SBMS is more than simply Meeting Management, as our current technical solution is also used for Member Management, Issue Management, Management of Cross-Party Groups.

Any future solution must as a minimum replicate current capabilities while enabling future enhancement.The current system has been in place since 2011 and supports both corporate meetings and formal Senedd Committee meetings. It also holds historical meeting data dating back to 1999, which would need to be migrated to any replacement solution.For certain data types, SBMS provides a primary data source for multiple other technical solutions via API connections.

These include systems supporting functions such as broadcasting, official records, and internal business management, helping to ensure consistency and interoperability across the wider Senedd system landscape.The existing system serves content to users through multiple channels:• Private content is delivered via intranet pages, secure extranet services for external stakeholders, and a Windows, Android, and iOS application that supports user interaction such as personal annotation.• System-to-system integration is supported through multiple API endpoints, enabling connectivity with other internal systems and supporting the publication of Open Data to the public.• Public content is delivered through website pages that support custom branding, enabling them to integrate seamlessly with and form part of the Senedd’s wider web presence. In some cases, these pages are ‘hybrid’, drawing on data from SBMS while being rendered externally to align with corporate branding, meaning the integration is not visible to end users.As part of this early-stage activity, we are inviting interested suppliers to submit a short questionnaire designed to help us understand current market capability, delivery models, and potential approaches to service provision.The information gathered through this engagement will support the Welsh Parliament in shaping any subsequent procurement strategy.

Participation is voluntary, and responses will be used for research and planning purposes only. Completion of the questionnaire does not form part of any formal procurement process, nor does it create any obligation or advantage in any future tender.Suppliers with relevant experience in delivering multilingual solutions are encouraged to take part.

The solution must support Welsh and English with full parity across all system components, including user interfaces, content, and system functionality. Where suppliers do not currently provide Welsh and English capability, they must demonstrate proven multilingual solutions that can deliver equivalent, robust bilingual support.