Commotion in the Murcia 7RM regional contest

Four of the five companies that have participated in the management competition of the Murcian regional government 7RM have shown their perplexity at the evaluations given by the contracting table.

Nine months after the call for the competition for the management of the Murcian regional television channel 7RM, a period totally unprecedented and inappropriate for any public award, since last Thursday the scores for the economic and technical proposals of the bidders have been known.

After terminating the contract with GTM in August 2012, the regional government authorized the tender in March of last year so that the new 7RM would be awarded at the end of 2014, although the deadlines have been extended.

Five offers were submitted to this contest: Secuoya, Mediapro, Vértice 360, GTM and Canal 8. Four of these five companies have shown their perplexity at the evaluations given by the contracting table, chaired by the general secretary of the Ministry of Finance, Fernando López Miras.

According to the tender specifications, the score given to the technical offers should assess the facilities, technical means and financial guarantees offered by each group. Although there is still no appeal, since there is still no firm resolution of the contract, four of the five companies that have submitted to the competition have shown their surprise at seeing how the Secuoya group was ahead of the Murcia group GTM (which operated the regional until 2012) in the score, which has a production center in the region valued at 30 million euros. For its part, Secuoya, which currently produces the 7 RM news programs, started with an approach of rented facilities. Secuoya has obtained 12.5 points in this section, while GTM has received 8.

The executive director of GTM, Anxo Quintanilla, has already requested that the Ministry and the hiring table clarify the evaluation criteria.

For their part, Channel 8 and Videoreport have also expressed their discomfort with the evaluations.

As for Mediapro, the group already announced that it will challenge the results of the contest called by the Community of Murcia for the management of the regional television channel (7RM), if the scores that were made public last Thursday in both the economic and technical sections are confirmed.

In the objective valuation section, Mediapro's economic offer has turned out to be the lowest of the five bidders and is 8.7% below the average of all offers, although it represents a saving for the finances of the Murcia Community of 2.7 million euros compared to the best rated offer.

However, after evaluating the technical aspects of the proposals, that is, when a purely subjective evaluation is made of them, the contracting table has lowered Mediapro's offer to fourth place among all those presented.

In the opinion of Mediapro, in the technical evaluation, "the tender specifications established evaluations of the proposal in entertainment programming, information services or sports programs, in which the Mediapro group has proven experience, with successful programs in practically all state and regional networks, as well as for channels in the United States, France, Great Britain, Brazil,... In fact, Mediapro is the only one of the bidders that is backed by the experience of having managed all of the services. required, with the launch and comprehensive management of various television channels at a national level in Spain and in other countries, such as the United States. Its offer also includes exclusive content such as the rights of Murcia, the Liga BBVA and the Copa del Rey. Despite this, Mediapro's proposal, in the technical section, has been less valued than other less consistent ones.

The Ministry of Economy and Finance has defended the board's criteria and has assured that there will be no possibility of appealing until the adjudication process is completed.

The regional government will pay the concessionaire a maximum of 1 million euros per month, including VAT. The exploitation contract will be for three years, extendable for another three years.