Award notice (Contract award notice)

An Award Notice, often abbreviated as CAN (Contract Award Notice), is the formal announcement that a public procurement contract has been awarded. In the European Union, contracting authorities must publish this notice in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU), accessible via the Tenders Electronic Daily (TED) portal, within 30 days after awarding the contract or concluding a framework agreement.

The notice provides essential details such as the name of the winning bidder, contract value, duration, and sometimes the reasons for selection. Publishing such information serves to uphold principles of transparency, accountability, and fair competition, by informing the market who secured the contract and under what terms.  

In practice, TED, maintained by the EU Publications Office, regularly publishes thousands of CANs as part of its “S” series supplements to the Official Journal. These notices facilitate open access to procurement data, enabling businesses, analysts, and civil society to monitor contract awards across the EU.