Definitions of country, municipalities, etc.

Article 7 of the Public Procurement Act (ÖAWG) defines the following terms and abbreviations:

"Contractor": the tenderer to whom a public contract has been awarded;

"works contract": the public contract for:

• the execution or simultaneous execution and design of a work relating to one of the activities or works referred to in Annex II to Directive 2014/24/EU or in Annex I to Directive 2014/23/EU; or
• the provision of a work by subcontractors in accordance with the requirements specified by the contracting entity, which has a decisive influence on the nature and design of the project, by whatever means;

"construction concession": a contract for pecuniary interest concluded in writing by which one or more contracting authorities entrust one or more undertakings with the provision of construction services, the consideration consisting either solely in the right to use the construction work covered by the contract or in this right plus a payment;

"construction work": the result of building and civil engineering works taken as a whole which, by its nature or purpose, is intended to fulfill an economic or technical function;

"Contract notice": the publishing of the intention to award a public contract or concession;

"Candidate": a natural or legal person who applies or has received an invitation to apply or to participate in a contest or concession procedure in a restricted procedure, a negotiated procedure, a negotiated procedure without prior publication, a competitive dialog or an innovation partnership;

"service contract": a public contract for the provision of a service not covered by point 2;

"service concession": a contract for pecuniary interest concluded in writing by which one or more contracting authorities entrust one or more undertakings with the provision and management of services other than the provision of works in accordance with point 3, where the consideration consists either solely in the right to exploit the services covered by the contract or in that right plus a payment;

"dynamic purchasing system": a fully electronic procedure for the procurement of supplies or services that are customary on the market and for which the characteristics generally available on the market meet the requirements of the contracting authority; this procedure is open throughout the entire duration of the procedure to any company that meets the eligibility criteria. It may be subdivided into categories of works, supplies or services objectively defined on the basis of characteristics of the intended award in the category concerned. These characteristics may include a reference to the maximum permissible scope of subsequent specific contracts or to a specific geographical area in which subsequent specific contracts are to be performed;

"Entity governed by public law" means an entity that:

• was established for the specific purpose of performing tasks in the general interest which are not of a commercial nature;
• Has legal personality; and
• is predominantly financed by the state, municipalities or other bodies governed by public law or which is subject to supervision by the latter with regard to its management or whose administrative, management or supervisory body consists mainly of members appointed by the state, municipalities or other bodies governed by public law;

"electronic means" means electronic equipment for the processing (including digital compression) and storage of data transmitted, conveyed and received by wire, by radio, by optical means or by other electromagnetic means;

"European Technical Assessment" means a documented assessment of the performance of a construction product in relation to its essential characteristics in accordance with the relevant European Assessment Document as defined in Article 2(12) of Regulation (EU) No 305/2011 laying down harmonized conditions for the marketing of construction products;

"EEA Agreement (EEA Agreement)" means the Agreement on the European Economic Area of May 2, 1992

"common technical specification" means a technical specification in the field of information and communication technology (ICT) drawn up in accordance with a procedure recognized by the EEA Member States or adopted in accordance with Articles 13 and 14 of Regulation (EU) No 1025/2012 on European standardization

"Collective application or offer (collective offer)": the joint application or offer of several applicants or tenderers who form a consortium;

"Supply contract": a public contract relating to the purchase, lease, rental, leasehold or installment plan, with or without purchase option, of goods. A public supply contract may include laying and installation work as ancillary activities;

"ancillary procurement activities" means activities in support of procurement activities relating to

• the provision of technical infrastructure enabling contracting entities to award public contracts or to conclude framework agreements for works, supplies or services;
• advising on the execution or planning of procedures for the award of public contracts;
• the preparation and management of procedures for the award of public contracts in the name and on behalf of the contracting entity concerned;

"standard" means a technical specification adopted by a recognized standards body for repeated or continuous application, compliance with which is not compulsory and which falls into one of the following categories

• "international standard" means a standard that has been adopted by an International Affairs standards organization and is available to the public;
• "European standard" means a standard adopted by a European standardization organization and made available to the public
• "national standard": a standard that has been adopted by a national standards organization and is available to the public

"Offer" (tender): the declaration of an offeror to perform a public contract or concession in the event of an award;

"Tenderer" (bidder): the natural or legal person who submits a tender.

"Public contract": the written contract for pecuniary interest between one or more undertakings and one or more contracting authorities for the execution of works, the supply of goods or the provision of services;

"Public communications services": the communications services which the EEA Member States have expressly entrusted to one or more telecommunications organizations in particular;

"public communications network" means the public communications infrastructure used to transmit signals between defined network termination points by wire, radio relay, optical or other electromagnetic means

"design contest" means the procedure used to provide the contracting authority with a plan or design, in particular in the fields of town and country planning, architecture and civil engineering or data processing, selected by a jury on the basis of a comparative assessment with or without the award of prizes;

'framework agreement' means an agreement between one or more contracting authorities and one or more undertakings, the purpose of which is to establish the terms governing contracts to be awarded during a given period, in particular with regard to the price envisaged and, where appropriate, the quantity envisaged

"in writing": any representation consisting of words or figures that can be read, reproduced and communicated. It may also include electronically transmitted and stored information;

"technical reference" means any reference which is not an official standard and which has been drawn up by a European standardization body in accordance with procedures adapted to the needs of the market

"technical specification for public works contracts" means the technical requirements contained in the tender dossier relating to a work, material, product or supply which enable the work, material, product or supply to be described in a manner such that it fulfills the use for which it is intended by the contracting authority. These characteristics include:

• Environmental performance levels, design for types of use (including accessibility for disabled persons) and conformity assessment, fitness for use, safety or dimensioning, including conformity assessment procedures, terminology, symbols, testing and test methods, packaging, marking and labeling, and production processes and methods; and
• the provisions concerning the design and calculation of works, the conditions for testing, inspection and acceptance of works, the methods or processes of construction and all other technical requirements which the contracting authority is able to prescribe by general and specific regulations for the finished works or the materials or parts necessary for them;

"technical specification for public works contracts" means the totality of the technical descriptions contained in particular in the tender dossier, defining the characteristics required of a material, product or supply in order to enable it to fulfill the use for which it is intended by the contracting authority. These properties include:

• Environmental and climate performance levels, "design for all" (including accessibility for persons with disabilities) and conformity assessment, performance, specifications for fitness for use, safety or dimensions, including quality assurance procedures, terminology, symbols, testing and test methods, packaging, marking and labeling, instructions for use and production processes and methods at each stage of the life cycle of the works; and
• the rules for design and costing, the conditions for testing, inspection and acceptance of works, the methods or procedures of construction and any other technical requirements which the contracting authority is in a position to prescribe by general and specific regulations for the finished works or the materials or parts necessary for them;

"technical specification for public supply and service contracts": a specification contained in a document prescribing characteristics for a product or service, such as quality levels, environmental and climate performance levels, "design for all" (including accessibility for persons with disabilities) and conformity assessment, performance, usability, safety or dimensional requirements of the product, including requirements for the name under which the product is sold, terminology, symbols, testing and test methods, packaging, marking and labeling, instructions for use, production processes and methods at each stage of the life cycle of the supply or service and conformity assessment procedures;

"life cycle" means all successive and/or interlinked stages, including the research and development to be carried out, production, trade and associated conditions, transportation, use and maintenance, during the lifetime of a good or construction or during the provision of a service, from the procurement of raw materials or generation of resources to disposal, clean-up and termination of the service or use;

"undertaking" (economic operator): a natural or legal person, a public body or a group of such persons and/or bodies, including any temporary association of undertakings, which offers on the market the execution of works, the erection of works, the supply of goods or the provision of services;

"variant offer (variant offer)": the offer for an alternative execution of the public contract;

"affiliated company": any undertaking whose annual accounts are consolidated with those of the contracting authority, candidate or tenderer in accordance with the provisions of the Persons and Companies Act (PGR) on consolidated accounts; in the case of contracting entities, candidates or tenderers not covered by the provisions of the PGR, affiliated companies are those over which the contracting entity, candidate or tenderer can directly or indirectly exercise a dominant influence or which can exercise a dominant influence over the contracting entity, candidate or tenderer or which, like the contracting entity, candidate or tenderer, are subject to the dominant influence of another company, whether by virtue of ownership, financial participation or the rules applicable to the company;

"centralized procurement activities": activities carried out on a permanent basis which concern

• the acquisition of supplies and/or services for contracting authorities; or
• the award of public contracts or the conclusion of framework agreements for works, supplies or services for contracting entities

"WTO Agreement" means the Agreement on Government Procurement of April 14, 1994

"central purchasing body" means a contracting authority that carries out centralized procurement activities and possibly ancillary procurement activities

"candidates concerned": the contracting authority has not provided them with a notice of rejection of their application before the award notice has been issued to the tenderers concerned;

"affected tenderers": they have not yet been definitively excluded. An exclusion is final if it has been communicated to the tenderers concerned and has either been recognized as lawful by the appeal authority or can no longer be subject to an appeal procedure;

"Road vehicle" means a vehicle belonging to one of the vehicle categories listed in Table 3 of the Annex to Directive 2009/33/EC. Excluded from this are vehicles in accordance with Art. 2 Para. 3 of Directive 2007/46/EC which are not subject to type approval or individual approval in accordance with road traffic legislation;

"Tender documents" (concession documents): all documents drawn up by the contracting authority or to which it refers in order to describe or define elements of the contract award, the concession or the procedure; these include the contract notice, the prior information notice if it serves as an invitation to tender, the technical specifications, the terms of reference, the proposed contract or concession conditions, formats for the submission of documents by candidates and tenderers, information on generally applicable obligations and other additional documents;

"procurement service provider" means a public or private entity offering ancillary procurement activities on the market

"electronic auction" means an iterative electronic procedure in which, after an initial full evaluation of the tenders, which are ranked using automatic evaluation methods, new prices revised downwards and/or new values based on certain components of the tenders are submitted. Certain works and service contracts involving an intellectual service, such as the design of works, which cannot be ranked using automatic evaluation methods, may not be the subject of electronic auctions;

'quality mark' means a document, certificate or attestation certifying that a given work, good or service, process or method meets certain requirements

"quality label requirements": the requirements that a construction work, a good or service, a process or a procedure must fulfill in order to receive the relevant quality label

"innovation": the realization of new or significantly improved goods, services or processes, including production, building or construction processes, a new marketing method or a new organizational process in terms of business practice, workplace operations or external relations, in order to, inter alia, contribute to addressing societal challenges or support the Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth

"Conflict of interest" means a situation in which employees of the contracting authority or of a procurement service provider acting on behalf of the contracting authority who are involved in the conduct of the procurement procedure or who may influence the outcome of the procedure have, directly or indirectly, a financial, economic or other personal interest which may be considered to affect their impartiality and independence in the context of the procurement procedure;

"concessionaire": a company that has been awarded a concession

"special or exclusive rights": rights arising from the authorization granted by the Principality of Liechtenstein or by the municipalities on the basis of legal and administrative provisions and which result in:

• the exercise of an activity being reserved to two or more undertakings; and
• the ability of other companies to carry out this activity is significantly impaired;

"electronic invoice" means an invoice that is issued, transmitted and received in a structured electronic format that enables it to be processed automatically and electronically;

'core elements of an electronic invoice' means a set of essential information elements that must be included in an electronic invoice and are essential for cross-border interoperability, including the information necessary to ensure compliance with legislation

"semantic data model" means a structured and logically linked set of terms and their meanings that reflects the core elements of an electronic invoice

"syntax" means the machine-readable language or dialect of a machine-readable language used to represent the data elements contained in an electronic invoice

"Syntax specifications": guidelines for the representation of a semantic data model for an electronic invoice in the various syntaxes;

'procurement' means the acquisition, by means of a public contract, of works, supplies or services by one or more contracting entities from entities selected by those contracting entities, whether or not those works, supplies or services are intended for a public purpose.