New public procurement reform could provide a protective umbrella for Europe’s bus industry – but will it be enough?

The European Commission’s public procurement reform proposal, presented on September 9, could also significantly strengthen the position of European bus manufacturers. One of the draft’s most important changes is that, in future, quality would carry far greater weight alongside price, while public buyers would receive new tools to give preference to products and companies of European origin. This could be particularly significant in the bus market, where the presence of Chinese manufacturers offering vehicles at lower prices has increased markedly in recent years. The new rules would not automatically exclude Chinese vehicles from EU tenders, but by taking account of European added value, security of supply, cybersecurity and other strategic considerations, they could fundamentally change the terms of competition.

The proposal for a new European public procurement regulation, published under the reference COM(2026) 590, would amount to a comprehensive reform of the EU public procurement system. The Commission would replace the current three public procurement directives with a single, directly applicable regulation, which would not only simplify procedures but also reduce differences between the rules of individual member states. The importance of public procurement is clearly illustrated by the fact that it accounts for around 15 percent of the European Union’s GDP, amounting to approximately €2.5 trillion annually.

Price alone would no longer be enough

Under the Commission’s plan, the best price-quality ratio would become the general evaluation principle in public procurement. As a rule, quality criteria would have to account for at least 30 percent of the evaluation, while for labour-intensive contracts this share would be at least 50 percent. Contracting authorities could deviate from this, but would have to justify how they ensure adequate quality by other means.

The concept of quality would also go far beyond the direct technical characteristics of a product or service. In addition to environmental, social and innovation requirements, security, resilience, the reliability of supply chains, cybersecurity and European preference could also appear in the evaluation.

This could bring particularly interesting changes to bus procurement. In the European electric bus market, Chinese manufacturers offering lower prices have become increasingly strong in recent years, while a large share of European vehicle manufacturers operate with higher production, energy and labour costs. Under the new system, however, alongside the bid price, significantly greater weight could be given to factors in which European manufacturers may seek to build a competitive advantage.

The reform now presented is in line on several points with measures that the European vehicle industry has been urging with increasing determination in recent months. At the end of May, the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA), the leaders of Europe’s truck and bus manufacturers, and their employee representatives warned the European Commission in a joint letter that, because of increasingly strong external competitors operating in different cost and regulatory environments, Europe could lose manufacturing capacity, technological know-how and industrial jobs.

In June, the leaders of Beulas, Hess, Solaris and VDL Bus Group drew Brussels’ attention specifically to the situation of the bus industry. In their joint open letter, the four independent European manufacturers called for the introduction of “Made in Europe” content requirements for publicly funded bus procurements, and for bus manufacturing to be classified among the strategic industries requiring European preference. They also specifically urged a transformation of the evaluation system for public procurement so that European bus manufacturing would carry greater weight not only in direct vehicle purchases, but also in public service tenders and concessions that involve the later procurement of buses.

A European advantage in public procurement

The draft goes even further than this. The new regulation would also establish the legal framework for a general European preference system, which would allow tenders from third countries to be restricted under certain conditions.

Under the proposal, public buyers could even exclude bids in which less than 50 percent of the total value originates in Europe. In some cases, they could also restrict participation exclusively to EU operators, or give preference to European bids during the evaluation. At the same time, the regulation would take account of the EU’s international trade and public procurement obligations, so this is not simply a matter of excluding all manufacturers from outside the Union.

The Commission would therefore not introduce a general “Buy European” obligation. Instead, the new system would create the possibility for EU public buyers to take the European added value of a bid and the EU’s economic, security and strategic interests into account more firmly than before.

Stéphane Séjourné, executive vice-president of the European Commission, put it even more clearly when presenting the proposal. According to his explanation, under the new rules a European municipality could exclude either a Chinese company or a European company offering a Chinese product if European firms do not have adequate access to that third country’s public procurement market. The contracting authority could also award additional points to European bids during the evaluation.

Chinese bus manufacturers could also be affected

All this is particularly important from the perspective of the European bus market. Until now, the EU public procurement market has remained extremely open to players from third countries, while European companies do not enjoy similar access in many external markets, and the tools introduced so far have only been able to address the resulting uneven competitive conditions to a limited extent. The current reform would bring meaningful change in this respect: it would make the maintenance of European industrial capacities, the reduction of strategic dependencies and the security of critical supply chains a direct part of public procurement decisions. This may be especially significant in the bus market because of the rapid gains made by Chinese manufacturers in recent years.

For Chinese manufacturers, therefore, the essential change would not be the automatic closure of the market, but the tightening of competitive conditions. Alongside price, additional factors could come to the fore that may make it more difficult than before to pursue a competitive strategy based solely on a lower purchase price.

Under the new system, when procuring a bus, factors such as supply chain security, cybersecurity risks, strategic dependency or European added value could also play a role alongside price and traditional technical parameters. The Commission’s proposal also allows, and in some cases requires, public buyers to address risks affecting critical infrastructure, sensitive information, cybersecurity, supply chains and unwanted influence by third countries.

In public transport, the significance of this is further increased by the fact that modern electric buses are no longer simply vehicles: they operate with networked IT systems, telematics services, remote diagnostics and the handling of substantial quantities of data. As a result, the origin of vehicles and the background of the technologies used may increasingly become an economic security issue in the eyes of the EU.

Public procurement is becoming an industrial policy tool

Behind the reform lies growing concern about the competitiveness of European industry. The Commission itself refers to earlier reports by Mario Draghi and Enrico Letta, one of whose recurring conclusions was that the European Union has so far made only limited use of its huge public procurement market to advance its own industrial and strategic objectives.

From this perspective, the change represents a genuine shift in approach. In future, the EU would use publicly funded demand more consciously to strengthen European manufacturing capacities, technological autonomy and the resilience of supply chains.

At the same time, rewriting public procurement rules will not in itself make the European bus industry more competitive. European preference and the greater weight of quality considerations may correct competitive disadvantages arising from differences in state aid, energy, labour and regulatory environments, but they cannot replace manufacturers’ own adaptation. No public procurement rule can solve high cost levels, overly complex production structures, slow development cycles or product strategies that lag behind market needs.

This is precisely why European preference can be a double-edged instrument. If applied properly, it can give European manufacturers time and room for manoeuvre to adapt, and can reduce the risk of European industry losing further market share to players that do not compete under the same economic and regulatory conditions. If, however, the preference becomes merely a protective umbrella and is not accompanied by cost reductions, faster development, technological progress and a product policy better aligned with market needs, then in the longer term it may weaken precisely the pressure to renew that the European bus industry needs.

In any case, the change will not happen overnight. The Commission proposal presented on September 9 must be agreed by the European Parliament and the Council representing the member states, and key elements of the draft may also change during the legislative process. According to the Commission’s proposal, the new rules would have to be applied after a two-year transition period following the regulation’s entry into force, so for the time being it is not possible to give a specific date from which the rules governing European public procurement may actually change.

If the elements relating to European preference and mandatory quality criteria remain in the final regulation, the new rules could substantially redraw the competitive conditions in the European bus market. Whether this ultimately truly strengthens Europe’s bus industry will no longer depend on Brussels alone. The new rules may give European manufacturers fairer conditions and more time, but they must turn that time into more competitive products, more efficient operations and faster adaptation. Otherwise, public procurement protection will not solve the European bus industry’s now clearly visible problems; it will merely postpone them.