Homburger successfully represented major Swiss business software developer against 69 Swiss municipalities in public procurement proceedings

During several years, 69 municipalities of the Canton of St. Gallen awarded important IT procurement contracts regarding financial, wage and HR software by private contract to a state-owned IT company. Based on public procurement law, software provider Abacus Research AG (Abacus) lodged appeals against these award decisions with the Administrative Court of St. Gallen in 2015 and 2016. It also filed requests for information based on the cantonal Freedom of Information Act. On July 2, 2018, the St. Gallen State Chancellery announced that Abacus, the state-owned IT company and the 69 municipalities had agreed on a comprehensive amicable settlement. All municipalities committed to conforming their conduct to public procurement law, with the four largest cities of the Canton committing to publicly tendering the procurement for major software license contracts by early 2019.

Homburger advised and represented Abacus in over 100 proceedings before the St. Gallen authorities, the Administrative Court of St. Gallen and the Swiss Federal Supreme Court. The Homburger team was led by partner Marcel Dietrich and comprised counsel Andreas Burger (both Competition, Regulatory).