India desk · For suppliers outside India
You don't need an Indian company. You need an Indian channel.
Indian public procurement runs through sellers registered in India — a PAN, a GST number, an Indian bank account. That is why selling to the Indian government looks like it starts with incorporating, and why most foreign suppliers stop there.
Our India practice is already a registered seller. Appoint it as your authorised channel and your products can be listed, approved and bid under an established account — in weeks, not a year.
Who does the work
The desk is run by our India practice, TenderBuddy
Based in Delhi, it has spent fifteen years doing this for Indian sellers — registration, brand approval, vendor assessment, bidding, orders and payments. The India desk points that same practice at suppliers outside India.
Figures are TenderBuddy’s own record as its India practice, not this publication’s. Evidence available on request.
What we do
Three ways in, depending on how far along you are
“Is there anything here worth chasing?”
India Opportunity Assessment
Before you spend anything on entry, a straight answer on whether your category is realistically winnable — which buyers purchase it, through which route, against whom, at what price level, and what qualifying would actually require of you.
- Category demand and the buyers who actually purchase it
- Route to market: GeM catalogue, bid, or CPPP tender
- Who currently wins, and at what price level
- Compliance gates specific to your products, with timelines
- A written recommendation, including when it is to walk away
Fixed fee, agreed before work starts
Most clients start here
“How do we sell there without setting up a company?”
Indian Channel Appointment
You appoint our Indian entity as your authorised channel. We are an existing registered seller, so your products can be listed, approved and bid under an established account rather than waiting on an incorporation.
- Authorised reseller or agency agreement, drafted to your terms
- OEM brand approval for your products
- Catalogue creation and listing under your brand
- Vendor assessment where your category requires it
- Ongoing listing, pricing and compliance maintenance
Setup fee, then monthly
“There is a live tender. Can you run it?”
Bid Management
We read the tender and its annexures, check you against every eligibility clause before you spend a day on it, assemble the documentation, and submit. The analysis is the same one published on this site, applied to your bid.
- Eligibility check against every qualifying clause, before you commit
- Document pack assembled and verified against the ATC
- Pricing structured for how that tender actually compares bids
- Submission, clarifications and the reverse auction if there is one
- Order, payment and incident management after award
Per bid, with a success component
How an engagement runs
Five steps, and a fixed fee before anything starts
A call, free
Thirty minutes. What you sell, where you sell it now, and whether Indian public procurement is a sensible target at all. We will say if it is not.
Gap audit
What exists against what the category requires — certifications, documentation, pricing position, and the specific gates your products must pass.
Written scope
Deliverables, timelines and a fixed fee, in writing, before any work begins. Nothing starts on a handshake and nothing is billed by the hour.
Execution
We do the work, with your approval at each checkpoint. Registration, approvals, listings, bids — whatever the scope covers.
Handover or retainer
Either we hand you a working channel and step back, or we keep running it. Both are fine; the choice is yours and it is not made at the start.
What we do not promise
That you will win. Nobody can promise that, and be wary of anyone who does. What we can do reliably is stop you losing for avoidable reasons — the documentation and eligibility failures that eliminate most first-time bidders before price is ever compared.
That we have influence with buyers. We do not, and we would not sell it if we did. Indian public procurement is transparent by design; the advantage available is understanding it better than your competitors, not knowing someone.
That your category is worth it. Some are not. The assessment exists partly to tell you that, and we would rather lose a fee than take one for work that was never going to pay back.
Start with a call. It costs nothing and it is not a pitch.
Thirty minutes on what you sell and whether Indian public procurement is a sensible target for it. If it is not, we will say so on the call — that answer is worth more to you than a proposal, and it costs us less than a client who should never have started.