Gemma Legal is the practice of Gemma Franco, a Spanish and Catalan lawyer specialised in public tenders. She guides bidders toward competitive, compliant offers, and helps contracting authorities design procedures that hold up to audit and appeal.
Winning the work and running the procedure are different disciplines. Having sat with the authority, the auditor and the bidder, Gemma reads each from the other's point of view.
Find the right opportunities, read the specifications precisely, and submit offers that are competitive and administratively sound. Fewer exclusions on technicalities, cleaner scoring, and a bid that says exactly what the authority needs to see.
Draft the specifications and administrative terms, structure lots and award criteria, and keep the file complete and defensible. From the first notice through award and execution, the procedure stays coherent and ready for scrutiny.
Gemma has drafted the specifications, advised evaluation committees, and checked files against public-sector audit standards. For a company bidding into a Spanish or Catalan tender, that inside view is the difference between a compliant offer and one excluded on a technicality.
The technical and administrative pliegos decide the entire tender. Gemma reads them with you so you know precisely what is required, and precisely what would exclude your bid if it is missed.
A full review of your bid against the requirements ahead of submission, so nothing is missing, mislabelled or incorrect by the time it reaches the evaluation committee.
Deadlines, guarantees and formal requirements are where sound offers are lost. Gemma advises on the details that are easy to get wrong and costly to repair once submitted.
Spain and Catalonia run their own procurement platforms, and the rules differ from most other countries. Gemma explains how the system actually works, so an international bidder competes on level terms instead of losing ground to unfamiliar process.
Focused work across the whole lifecycle of a public contract, in Spanish, Catalan and English.
Opportunity review, eligibility and solvency checks, offer structuring, and submission on public procurement platforms.
Drafting and reviewing technical and administrative specifications, procurement files, and lot design for contracting authorities.
Aligning procedures with EU directives and Spanish public-sector law, including electronic procurement and full traceability.
Special appeals in public procurement and administrative appeals, on both the challenging and the defending side.
Support through milestones, service levels, modifications and penalty regimes once a contract has been awarded.
Ex-ante and ex-post intervention against public-sector audit standards, subsidies and EU funding mechanisms.
A selection of public procurement procedures, spanning multi-million-euro supply contracts, network-wide maintenance, and fixed-deadline event delivery.
An EU-wide open tender, run under the harmonised procedure, for the supply, installation and commissioning of four new weather radars across Catalonia. The contract was awarded after competitive bidding against five international suppliers, with delivery structured into staged milestones over a 128-week schedule.
An open tender split into two geographic lots, north and south, for the upkeep of the XEMA network. The southern lot, covering 87 stations, was awarded at 18.19% below the tender's base budget, a result that combined technical coverage with real budgetary discipline.
Preventive and corrective maintenance of Catalonia's weather radar network on a two-year term from January 2026. The contract used tiered pricing tied to response times, including a four-hour response reduction and a commitment to zero-emission service vehicles.
A simplified open tender for the design, construction, assembly and dismantling of the Generalitat de Catalunya stand at Mobile World Congress 2025, held from 3 to 6 March. Scope included technical assistance, cleaning and power supply throughout the event, with no room in the timeline for slippage.
Public money deserves procedures that are correct, competitive, and able to withstand any review.Gemma Franco
Gemma Franco is a lawyer qualified in Spain, specialised in public procurement, contract law and public-sector compliance. Her experience runs across regional administration, public-sector audit and control, and private practice, so she reads a procedure from the authority that publishes it, the auditor who checks it, and the company that bids for it.
As a Public Procurement Officer she led the legal drafting and review of tender documentation and administrative terms, coordinated evaluation committees, and advised on coherent legal interpretation across technical and administrative units. In a public-sector audit and control role she carried out ex-ante and ex-post intervention, drafted opinions on EU funding and subsidies, and managed special appeals in procurement. Earlier, in private practice, she advised startups and research centres through financing rounds and technology transfer, and managed procurement files end to end.
She now works as an independent consultant, taking on remote engagements with clients across Spain and the wider European Union.
Whether you are preparing a bid or running a procedure, the earlier the legal work starts, the stronger the position. Tell Gemma what you are working on and by when.