Asia Public Tenders: Portals and Access

Two channels, two rulebooks

Before looking for a portal, find out who pays for the contract. There is no Asian equivalent of the EU’s TED: notices are split between two channels with very different rules.

Projects financed by a multilateral bank: the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the World Bank. The borrower runs the procurement under the lender’s rules: English-language notices, international procedures, eligibility set by the bank.
Nationally funded purchases, published on each country’s portal, in its language, with its own registration requirements. How open they are to foreign bidders depends on the country’s international commitments.

For a company new to the region, the first channel is usually the easier way in: standard documents, English throughout, rules known in advance.

Who can bid: the GPA and trade agreements

For nationally funded contracts, the key instrument is the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA). According to the WTO’s list of parties, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Chinese Taipei and Hong Kong, China are parties, alongside the EU, the UK, Canada, the US, Switzerland and others. Their covered entities must treat suppliers from other parties no less favourably than domestic ones above the agreement’s thresholds. Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines and China are observers only, which creates no market-access obligation.

Bilateral agreements add to this. The European Commission’s Access2Markets guide to contracts outside the EU lists, for this region, the EU–Japan Economic Partnership Agreement and free trade agreements with Singapore, South Korea and Vietnam. Vietnam matters most, because it is not a GPA party: the Commission’s EU–Vietnam FTA page lists covered buyers including central ministries, public bodies in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, the power utility EVN, Vietnam Railways and a list of public hospitals, with thresholds phased down over time. For CPTPP parties such as Canada and the UK, the trans-Pacific agreement’s procurement chapter covers Malaysia and Vietnam, as the UK government’s Malaysia guidance explains. The EU is not a CPTPP party.

ADB and AIIB: project procurement

The Asian Development Bank, based in Manila, has 69 members, 50 of them from the region. Its project notices cover transport, energy, water, urban development, health and education: advance notices, invitations for bids and prequalification, contract awards. Consulting follows a separate track: recruitment notices appear on CSRN, and firms must register in the Consultant Management System before submitting an expression of interest. The origin rule is strict: ADB financing is limited to goods, works and services from member countries. The list of members includes France, Germany, the UK, Canada and the US among its non-regional members.

The AIIB, based in Beijing, takes the opposite approach: its procurement policy lets firms from all countries bid, members or not, except debarred or sanctioned parties. On 24 September 2026 its opportunity list held 1,120 documents dating back to 2016, 278 of them published in 2026: general and specific procurement notices, requests for expressions of interest, procurement plans and contract awards. Its projects reach beyond Asia, to Türkiye and Azerbaijan for instance.

The World Bank also finances many projects in the region, with its own notice database. For all three banks, two habits pay off: track general procurement notices, which announce a project’s contracts months before the tenders, and check which bank finances each lot, because the financing bank sets eligibility.

Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan: the open markets

Japan. The JETRO procurement database publishes English summaries of notices covered by the GPA, the EU–Japan EPA and the UK–Japan CEPA; the government has designated it the single point of access under those agreements. It is updated on each publication day of the official gazette, Kanpo. For contracts awarded between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2028, the central-government threshold is 100,000 SDR, or ¥20 million, for goods and for services other than construction and engineering, according to JETRO. Tender documents themselves are in Japanese; electronic bidding runs through the government procurement portal and requires a registered electronic certificate.

South Korea. Public buyers publish on KONEPS (Nara Jangteo), in Korean. For purchases of foreign goods, the Public Procurement Service describes a dedicated procedure: specifications are pre-published for 7 days for industry comment, bids are prepared in English, and foreign bidders may complete their registration up to contract signature, with a business registration issued or notarised in their home country.

Singapore. The Ministry of Finance publishes its requirements on GeBIZ, in English, and states that no special preference is given. Responding requires a GeBIZ Trading Partner account; a company without a Singapore entity number registers through Corppass using a foreign ID, as set out in the official guide, with certified English translations of non-English documents.

Taiwan. The Public Construction Commission’s e-procurement system offers an English tender search. The Government Procurement Act governs foreign suppliers’ participation by the treaties Taiwan is party to, and lets tender documents specify the qualification documents foreign suppliers must provide.

Vietnam, Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia: read the conditions first

Vietnam. The national e-procurement system, under the Ministry of Finance, has an English interface and a section for procurement covered by trade agreements. The Law on Bidding No. 22/2023/QH15 requires a foreign bidder in international bidding to form a joint venture with a Vietnamese contractor or use Vietnamese subcontractors, unless no domestic contractor has the required capacity.

Philippines. Since December 2020, procuring entities have been advised to post their opportunities on PhilGEPS, in English. However, the implementing rules of RA 12009 reserve goods contracts, as a rule, for entities at least 60% Filipino-owned; foreign bidders qualify only in cases set by the procurement policy board, for instance reciprocity certified by their government. For infrastructure, a treaty or international agreement must provide for it.

Thailand. The Comptroller General’s Department’s e-GP portal is in Thai, and bidding requires registration as a supplier. The US State Department’s 2025 Investment Climate Statement notes the 2021 “Made in Thailand” initiative, which directs agencies to buy at least 60% of their goods from local producers.

Malaysia. Federal notices appear on ePerolehan. According to the UK government guidance cited above, any company must be registered with Malaysia’s Ministry of Finance, and works contracts also require PKK and CIDB registration.

Beyond defence: what gets bought

Both regional banks mainly finance infrastructure. For construction and engineering firms this is the core of the flow: roads, rail, water, energy, health and education buildings. Manufacturers and equipment suppliers find supply lots: meters, pumps, electrical equipment, medical devices. On the national side, Korea’s Public Procurement Service lists machinery, medical equipment, rolling stock and communications equipment among its foreign purchases.

IT and consulting run through every channel: information systems financed by projects, technical assistance, construction supervision, studies. The bid / no-bid framework helps decide which of these notices deserve a response.

Bidding: the checkpoints

An Asian tender takes longer to prepare than a domestic one. Four questions before committing a team:

Are you eligible? Member country for ADB, no debarment for AIIB, covered entity and threshold met in a GPA country, nationality rules in Vietnam and the Philippines.
Can you submit? GeBIZ account through Corppass, electronic certificate in Japan, PPS registration in Korea, ADB CMS registration: some of these take weeks.
Can you handle the language? English for the banks, Singapore and the Philippines; Japanese, Korean, Thai or Vietnamese for national tender documents, with certified translations of company documents.
Can you deliver? Local partner where the law requires one, bank guarantees, logistics, payment currency.

What VIGLIA covers today

VIGLIA monitors more than 200 official sources in more than 60 countries, across six continents. In East and Southeast Asia, its presented source perimeter includes Japan’s P-Portal, China’s CCGP public notices, the tender notices of Hong Kong’s Government Logistics Department, the part of PhilGEPS readable without an account in the Philippines, and JICA’s procurement notices. World Bank procurement notices and UNGM, the United Nations agencies’ procurement portal, are monitored as well. Elsewhere in Asia, VIGLIA also monitors India’s GeM, two Pakistani portals and the portals of eight countries in the Middle East and the Caucasus, from the United Arab Emirates to Georgia. Each monitored perimeter is agreed with the client.

VIGLIA does not yet cover ADB, AIIB, GeBIZ, KONEPS, the Vietnamese system, e-GP or ePerolehan: they are outside the collected perimeter. For those channels, the official links above remain the reference.

On the sources it covers, VIGLIA matches each notice to your catalog by reading its content, without relying on CPV codes these notices do not carry, and keeps the link to the original publication.

FAQ

Can a European or Canadian company bid on Asian Development Bank tenders?

Yes, if its country is an ADB member. Procurement financed from ADB resources is restricted to goods, works and services from member countries. ADB has 69 members; non-regional members include France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. Consulting firms must first register in ADB's Consultant Management System; bids for goods and works go to the executing agency named in each notice.

Which Asian countries must treat foreign suppliers like local ones?

For covered entities above the thresholds, the Asian parties to the WTO Government Procurement Agreement: Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Chinese Taipei and Hong Kong, China. Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines and China are only observers. Bilateral agreements add access for their own partners: the EU has agreements in force with Japan, Korea, Singapore and Vietnam, and CPTPP parties such as Canada and the UK are covered in Malaysia and Vietnam.

Do Asian tenders use CPV codes?

No. CPV is a European nomenclature. ADB and AIIB classify notices by country and sector, and national portals use their own categories, often in the local language. Monitoring by CPV code sees nothing there: each notice has to be read for its subject, buyer and country.

Reference sources

Consult the references below and our editorial method. Original documents remain authoritative; a summary does not replace your team's review. Editorial method.