OCRE 2024 and the Pan-European Framework Agreement on Services cloud, in force since February 3, 2025, for a period of five years, which allows the European public, research and educational institutions can enjoy services cloud innovative in an easy, compatible and economical way.
THE Géant Association, 39 NRENs (National Research and Education Networks) and more than 30,000 public European institutions collectively negotiated a pan-European framework agreement establishing the terms (price, quality, quantity, obligations and service ordering procedures) with the most important service providers Cloud IaaS+, and where it is up to the Portuguese NREN – the FCCN, digital services unit of Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) – streamline the procedures required for contracting between Confirmed Entities and suppliers.
Who is it intended for?
The OCRE 2024 Framework Agreement is intended for 108 national entities that expressed their intention to participate, until January 31, 2024.
- See the OCRE Catalog 2024.
Advantages of OCRE Framework Agreement
- Collective expenses and discounts:
- Better legal and financial conditions;
- Minimum discount on the list price and several additional discounts;
- Entry and exit fees Cloud not charged.
- Ease and simplification of access to services, without the need for separate competitions;
- Reduction in times in processes, contractual procedures and waiting times to use services;
- Legal benefits: terms and conditions in compliance with European Union (EU) Directives which implies less legal costs, time and effort;
- Strengthening compliance with European and national standards in the areas of:
- Sustainability;
- Privacy;
- Security;
- Reports.
- Direct peering, high capacity and low latency;
- Single sign on (SSO) and SAML user authentication across all services cloud connected to the Géant data network, reducing network traffic costs;
- Support in the process of exiting the agreement, with lower costs;
- Identity management (including support for eduGAIN);
- Bring Your Own License (BYOL);
- Local, fractional and/or billing CRF (Cost Recovery Fee);
- Expanded access to additional training and support resources.
Service Features
The offer of OCRE Framework Agreement 2024 presents a portfolio of 416 services cloud in 17 platforms for solutions IaaS+, based on framework agreements between GÉANT and 40 service providers.
In this context, the solutions IaaS+ may optionally include:
- PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service)
- SaaS (Software-as-a-Service)
Platform and Suppliers selected for Portugal
The OCRE 2024 Framework Agreement is organized into a country-by-country lot structure, incorporating additional competition between resellers or similar providers for each platform/service sublot. Each supplier was quoted based on the OCRE 2024 Framework Agreement criteria.
For Portugal, Lot 30, nine service platforms/sub-lots were selected, with their respective suppliers ordered by best classification, as shown in the table below.
Procedures
An institution may enter into a contract using one of three procedures: Direct Award, Desktop Minicompetition (DMC) and Minicompetition (RMC).
Institutions can use a decision tree (illustrative image below) to determine the most appropriate type of procedure.
The OCRE 2024 Framework Agreement Guide for Institutions provides detailed information on the structure of the Framework Agreement, a description of benefits and functions, how to adopt and start provisioning services cloud through one of the three acquisition procedure options.
OCRE 2020 Framework Agreement and transition to OCRE 2024
The OCRE 2020 framework ran from December 1, 2020 to November 30, 2024. Participating institutions in OCRE 2020 that contracted services with a provider by November 30 will have their contracts extended for a maximum period of up to four years. They may also choose to terminate, upon agreement, and establish a new contract under the OCRE 2024 Framework Agreement. In the case of Microsoft, the benefits granted by OCRE 2020 are only guaranteed until November 30, 2025.
Considering that some institutions have contracted services cloud under the OCRE 2020, such extensions – if necessary – could be relatively straightforward to implement and serve as an interim solution during any transition period to the new Framework Agreement.
Additional relevant documentation
Consult The new GÉANT cloud framework – OCRE 2024.
Watch the OCRE2024 national launch session and view the respective presentation .
