Two weeks after terminating the first tender, the government of Kenya has opened a new opportunity to bidders who are interested in providing laptops for primary schools as it has released a new tender.
The termination of the previous process was done because the Kenyan government said that the pricing was way above their budget and hopes the fresh tenders will come soon as they are working to beat the deadline, which was 2014.
Firms tendering for the job must deposit bid bonds of Sh7.5 million for printers, Sh10 million for projectors and Sh50 million for laptops.
Bidders are required to deliver their bids to the head of supply chain management services at the Ministry of Education on November 14.
Prof Jacob Kaimenyi, Education Secretary, had cited higher specifications as one of the possible reasons that drove the prices up, but it is not known if they have reduced the specs in the new tender.
However,teachers are expected to have laptops that are of a higher specification than that of the children, according to the new plan.
Kaimenyi also acknowledged that disagreements among the vendors, high insurance, transport and storage costs may have influenced the price hicks.
Evaluation of the bids by the ministry’s technical team showed that bids had priced each laptop at between Sh23,000 and Sh28,000.
The government will be spending Sh17.4 billion annually in the next three years to buy 1.35 million laptops, development of digital content, building capacity of teachers and rolling out computer laboratory for Class Four to Class Eight in all schools throughout the country as laptops will only be given to students between class one and three.
The ministry also seeks to procure 20,637 printers and to distribute a similar number of projectors to each primary school across the country.