Bidding Strategy Analysis Of Design-Build/EPC Projects

Recently, more and more Design-Build/EPC projects have appeared in the Chinese construction market. However, academia and practitioners carried out more studies about tendering procedure and criteria of selecting a contractor than studies on bidding strategy of Design-Build/EPC projects from the perspective of a contractor. This thesis intends to fill this research gap.Based on theories of bidding and Design-Build/EPC projects, this thesis firstly analyzed the bid/no-bid decision making; a series of bidding key factors which influenced bidders'bid/no-bid decision-making were discussed, including"competition","risk","need of work"and"company's position in bidding process". Thereafter, a bid/no-bid decision model was established with four hierarchies formulated respectively for the four key factors. Thereupon, the thesis suggested that a design, procurement and construction proposal should be given a deep analysis when preparing the technical proposal. Especially for management strategy, it was necessary for the bidder to inform the employer that he had the required capability to manage the internal and external incidents occurred in design, procurement and construction processes. In the analysis of bidding price proposal, with the project's cost having been identified, the thesis gave a mark-up rate selection model with AHP technique and a game model which was used to select a most competitive bidding price proposal. At the end of this thesis, the strategy of negotiation was discussed that the bidder should prepare a detailed communication plan with the information of other competitors and pay more attention to his own advantage of technical proposal so that he can grasp the principle of price decreasing, while building the friendly partnering relationship with the employer.This thesis made the use of the systems analysis and qualitative/quantitative research method to solve almost problems occurred in the bidding process of Design-Build/EPC projects. These bidding strategies will be helpful to a contractor to bid for a Design-Build/EPC project successfully.