Scottish Water is seeking supply chain interest ahead of going out to tender early next year with a Digital Directorate Partner contract worth an estimated £400 million.

Scottish Water’s Digital Directorate is responsible for delivering digital and technology services and solutions for its core business.

In recent years, the company has replaced much of its enterprise legacy applications with modern evergreen SaaS solutions, including Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, Workday, Oracle fusion, Oracle Primavera and IBM Maximo.

Scottish Water has invested in Microsoft Azure as its primary cloud platform and is now modernising its network offerings – its strategy is to move to a software defined network approach.

According to Scottish Water, the convergence of IT and OT has accelerated as its assets become increasingly connected to the internet using a growing array of sensors and driven by opportunities to enhance service, reduce cost and carbon emissions via an intelligent asset base.

The utility says supplier arrangements that seamlessly integrate complex and high-scale digital innovations with engineering practices across capital investment are essential.

Scottish Water is exploring how such arrangements can align with the Project 13 'enterprise' delivery model – the model is based on bringing together owners, partners, advisers and suppliers, working in more integrated and collaborative arrangements, underpinned by long term relationships.

The water company is now looking for supplier arrangements which operate at scale, with demonstrable breadth of experience, portfolio and subject matter resources, as well as the ability to manage a wider supply chain where required.

The requirement is for a supply chain that delivers knowledge, expertise of modern technology, provides access to innovation, and can act as both integrator and expert adviser on Artificial Intelligence (AI), automation, digital twins and other relevant technologies.

Scottish Water says its intention is to build supplier relationships with those who have a clear strategy and methodology which supports and develops modern engineering practices such as Platform Engineering, DevOps, CI/CD, Automation, Software Defined Networking, Zero Trust, IT/OT convergence and who are capable of continuously implementing technology transformation in a secure way.

Scottish Water requires access to digital skills as well as product, programme and project support in a flexible way to achieve objectives under its Digital Strategy, whilst building relationships with suppliers who can partner in maturing our digital strategy, and implementing and transferring knowledge, as well as leveraging frontier technology.

The utility is interested in obtaining market views as to how best to group the following services for procurement and intends to issue a questionnaire on this shortly.

• Network Services
• Security Services
• Operational Technology Services
• End User Services
• Application (Product) Services
• Cloud Services
• Data & Analytics services

Suppliers are invited to confirm their interest by emailing This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , confirming the name of their organisation and company registration number to register interest.

Once suppliers have officially expressed an interest in the opportunity, they will then be issued a questionnaire directly via email to review, populate and return to Scottish Water by a specific date.

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