Tender Math: A Fintech Calculator Is Changing How Businesses Approach Government Procurement
Tochka Bank has launched a free digital calculator that helps bidders estimate the cost of fulfilling a tender they are interested in and determine whether it makes financial sense to lower their initial bid.
The tool makes tender bidding more mathematically sound and significantly reduces the risk of taking on unprofitable contracts. In a single interface, entrepreneurs can use the bank’s Tender Search service to find suitable opportunities in Russia’s Unified Information System for Procurement and on federal, regional, and commercial electronic trading platforms. They can then use the calculator to estimate potential profits and financial obligations.
Precise Cost Estimates
For sole proprietors and small businesses without in-house financial analysts, the new service can save both time and money. It helps them assess the true financial burden of a contract, including the risk of cash-flow gaps caused by delayed payments or the need to finance work upfront. It also accounts for taxes, insurance contributions, material costs, and other overheads, all before a bid is submitted. By helping businesses avoid tenders that are unprofitable from the outset, the tool can reduce the risk of contractors going bankrupt.
Preliminary cost estimates are especially valuable in capital-intensive industries such as construction, equipment supply, and roadwork.
“In construction tenders, entrepreneurs often rely on cost estimates, their own spreadsheets, or experience from previous projects to approximate expenses and profits. It’s important to know in advance whether they’ll have enough money to fulfill the contract and whether the potential profit will justify the effort. We want entrepreneurs to enter bidding with a clear understanding of the financial upside, rather than take on work at a loss. Sometimes, turning down an unprofitable contract is the best business decision,” said Dmitry Bursalidi, product manager for the Construction Business segment at Tochka Bank.
Market Potential
The service launched in early October for a reason: companies actively sign contracts in the fall for the following year. Russia’s procurement market is growing. According to the Russian Finance Ministry, the market reached 14.6 trillion rubles (about $174 billion) in 2025, up 21% from 2024.
Around 30% of Russian companies participate in procurement regularly, although many more would like to enter the market. For small and midsize businesses, one major deterrent is uncertainty about whether a contract will actually turn a profit. A study by Moyo Delo, an accounting service for businesses, found that 17% of surveyed entrepreneurs consider tenders high-risk, while 33% believe they are suitable only for large companies. Financial calculators built into tender-search services could help dispel those misconceptions.
Artificial intelligence is expected to expand what these tools can do. Instead of entering the initial data manually, entrepreneurs could let a system extract it from lengthy procurement documents, forecast costs, and flag risks. Similar solutions are already available in Russia, and demand is likely to grow.
From Basic Automation to Ecosystems
Fintech tools for Russia’s tender market have become more sophisticated over the years. Five years ago, they focused on basic automation. VTB, for example, introduced an automatic top-up service for special accounts used to secure bids. More advanced analytical systems followed, including the STAR platform from Russian company DD Planet and a tender CRM system from the All-Russian Business Center featuring a neural network that matches tenders to a company’s profile, along with a margin calculator. In 2024, Tochka Bank launched Tochka Procurement, an aggregator for finding contracts and arranging guarantees. A year later, Alfa-Bank introduced an AI assistant for government procurement, while B2B-Center rolled out algorithms to forecast supplier activity. The market is moving beyond automating routine banking transactions toward integrated ecosystems that can do more than aggregate data: they can also forecast financial outcomes.
Practical Digitalization
Demand for tender calculators and AI assistants for procurement is likely to keep rising, as small and midsize businesses need accessible tools to assess contract profitability. Competition for customers is pushing providers to develop more comprehensive analytics that model financial outcomes and integrate seamlessly with corporate accounting systems. Banks and specialized IT platforms are giving businesses practical help with financial modeling, making the digital transformation of government procurement increasingly useful in day-to-day operations. This is part of a broader trend toward digitizing the economy.
