Purpose 
To describe the governance and procurement process for Proton Beam Therapy (PBT) equipment in new National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) building.

Methods 
Approval to establish a proton beam therapy facility in the new NCCS building at Outram Campus was obtained in 2012. A Board-level committee was formed to provide governance over the procurement process. Under this board, the project committee was formed to manage the procurement process. 

A two-stage procurement process was adopted. A Request-For-Information (RFI) was first called. Potential Proton Beam Therapy Equipment Vendors (PTEVs) provided base information about their equipment and their company strengths and profiles. Shortlisted PTEVs were invited to participate in the second-stage Request-For-Proposal (RFP) wherein detailed proposals were submitted.    

Proposals submitted by shortlisted PTEVs were evaluated by 7 separate evaluation teams namely: Technical, Service, Interface (Building), Contract mark-up, Organization, Commercial, and Price. To ensure that the merits of the proposals by PTEVs were not influenced by price, a two-envelope system process was employed within the RFP exercise. The price proposal was not evaluated until the 6 other teams had completed their assessment based on technical/functional of the vendors’ proposals.  Down-selected PTEVs were invited to improve their offers in a Best-and-Final-Offer (BAFO) exercise.

Results 
A PTEV was selected to be the Preferred PTEV. A second PTEV was selected to be the Reserve PTEV.

Conclusion
The procurement process for PBT equipment in the new NCCS has been conducted in a transparent and open manner as described above.

Governance and procurement process for Proton Beam Therapy (PBT) Equipment in new National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) Building