Design Contest Result Notice

A Design Contest Result Notice closes the public record of a design contest competition. It is published on TED after the jury has reached its decision and prizes have been awarded, providing the same transparency function that a Contract Award Notice provides for standard procurement procedures.

What is a Design Contest Result Notice?

Under Directive 2014/24/EU, contracting authorities must publish a Design Contest Result Notice on TED within 30 days of the conclusion of the design contest. The notice must identify the selected participants and prize winners, include the jury report or a summary of its findings, and confirm whether the winner has been or will be invited to negotiate a follow-on contract for implementing the winning design.

The jury report is a legally significant document. It must record the jury's ranking of submissions and the reasons for its choices. The report is attached to the Result Notice or referenced in it, creating a transparent public record of how the jury applied the published evaluation criteria. This is important for unsuccessful participants who may wish to understand why their submission did not win.

If the winning contestant is subsequently invited to negotiate a follow-on service contract (for example, to develop a winning architectural concept into a full construction design), this negotiation is conducted under the competitive procedure with negotiation rules of Directive 2014/24/EU. The invitation to negotiate is not a separate competitive procedure but a direct follow-on from the contest, provided it was signalled in the Design Contest Notice.

Under eForms, the Design Contest Result Notice maps to specific notice subtypes within the result notice family. The eForms SDK defines the mandatory business term fields for this notice type, including jury composition and decision fields.

Why Design Contest Result Notices matter for bidders

For design professionals, Result Notices are the primary source of publicly available information about who won a significant public design commission and on what grounds. Reading jury reports across multiple competitions in your sector helps you understand what qualities evaluators value, how leading competitors are positioning their work, and what design approaches are succeeding in public procurement contexts.

Result Notices also confirm the route to follow-on services. If you were an unsuccessful participant and the winner is being invited to negotiate a full commission directly, you know the market is closed for this project. If no follow-on commission was promised, the work may re-enter the market through standard procurement later.

Example

A Belgian federal building agency publishes a Design Contest Result Notice recording the outcome of an architectural competition for a new court building. First prize (EUR 60,000) was awarded to a Brussels-based architectural practice. The jury report, attached to the notice, explains that the winning submission was selected for its integration with the surrounding historic streetscape and its innovative use of natural light in public spaces. The notice confirms that the winner will be invited to negotiate a contract for the full architectural and engineering commission.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I see the jury report in the Result Notice?

The full jury report is attached to or referenced in the Result Notice. For TED notices, the report may be available as an attachment or via a link to the authority's procurement portal. The Directive requires the report to be made available to unsuccessful participants on request.

What happens if the jury cannot reach a unanimous decision?

The jury's decision is based on a majority where unanimous agreement is not possible, and the reasons for dissenting views must be recorded in the jury report. The contracting authority may ask the jury to reconsider if the result is irregular, but cannot override the jury's substantive design judgment.

Do I have to accept the jury's invitation to negotiate a follow-on contract?

No. The winning participant is invited to negotiate but is not obligated to accept a follow-on commission. Negotiations may fail if the parties cannot agree on terms. In that case, the authority would typically need to launch a new procurement procedure.