Nota editorial: Este post reproduce la contribución Trends and Developments preparada por Fernando Mejía M., Mario Mejía K., Pablo Sandoval D. y Karla Mendoza R. para Chambers Global Practice Guides - Public Procurement 2026. Se conserva la atribución a Chambers and Partners y se incluye una sección final de fuentes, notas y lineamientos de distribución.
Source and attribution
Original title: Focus on Public Procurement in the Mexican Health Sector
Original publication: Chambers Global Practice Guides - Public Procurement 2026
Original section: Mexico: Trends and Developments, pp. 12-16
Contributors: Fernando Mejía M., Mario Mejía K., Pablo Sandoval D. and Karla Mendoza R., Mejía, Guízar & Kargl
Recommended external link: Chambers Global Practice Guides - Public Procurement 2026: Mexico
Context and recent background
In view of the various legal and public policy changes that, in recent years, have led to deficient contractual procedures, there has been a shortage of supplies in the Mexican public sector. This has forced the administrative authorities to take action, often outside the legal framework, as an urgent measure to combat the situation.
As a result, a new Law on Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services has been enacted, introducing various new features that had previously been implemented as public policies even without legal backing.
It appears that the new Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act was the result of experience gained from contracting for the procurement of health supplies during the previous six-year term and the first year of the current one. During this time, there have been radical changes in contracting models, from the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público or SHCP), the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) and the Institute of Health for Wellbeing (Instituto de Salud para el Bienestar or INSABI), to Biologicals and Reagents Laboratories of Mexico (BIRMEX).
With this in mind, it is worth taking a moment to look at the main changes introduced by the reform in the area of public procurement.
The governing authority under the new public procurement model
Under the new public procurement model, the Anti-Corruption and Good Governance Secretariat becomes the governing authority.
This authority has considerable power, with the ability to interpret the Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act; issue policies, rules and guidelines on contracting in place of those previously issued by each authority; and consolidate tenders. It also determines the formula for calculating the 65% national integration requirement and even has the power, among many others, to issue general rules establishing exceptions to this requirement. It is the governing authority for general public procurement policy, with the power to issue any administrative provisions necessary for the proper enforcement of the Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act.
Similarly, the creation of a Strategic Procurement Committee is envisaged, whose main function will be to identify goods and services that are necessary for the State and can therefore be procured through consolidated schemes.
For its part, the SHCP continues to participate in the operation of consolidated procurement processes and has been given new powers, while the Ministry of Health retains sectoral co-ordination functions related to the planning of the supply of medicines and other medical supplies.
New modalities
While it is true that only three modalities were previously used in the area of public procurement - public tender, invitation to at least three persons, and direct award - the reforms now propose new modalities.
Competitive dialogue: the SHCP acts as a consolidating entity and is responsible for interacting with previously evaluated suppliers to define solutions before submitting bids on projects that require complex or innovative technical solutions.
Direct award with a negotiation strategy: this is a procurement mechanism used in emergency situations, which allows for faster procurement processes.
The direct award mechanism is used when there are unforeseeable events that create urgency; delays in contracting could cause serious damage or harm to the State; or it is not possible to obtain the goods or services in a timely manner through traditional competitive procedures.
Although this is a direct award, elements such as competition and negotiation are incorporated through a simplified procedure that includes dissemination of a request for quotations on the web platform; receipt of technical and financial bids from interested parties; and technical evaluation of the proposals and a structured negotiation phase, led by a negotiation leader appointed by the SHCP.
In this regard, although the Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act regulates a supposed order of priority regarding the origin of the contracting event, the truth is that it does so in a completely flexible manner. This includes new exceptions to the National Public Tender so that an international procedure without treaty coverage can be carried out when it is convenient in terms of price, derived from the results of market research, the lowest price of foreign goods, leases, or services not covered by treaties is more convenient than the lowest price in the domestic market, and has a margin of preference of up to fifteen percent in its favour, under equal conditions.
Subsequent discount offers
Similarly, the reform also promotes the use of subsequent discount offers, which can be defined as a scheme that allows participants to progressively adjust their price proposals during the course of the procurement procedure.
At this point, it is important to note that the contracting procedure known as direct award with negotiation strategy has a peculiarity, as the procedure to be followed is only established when no benefit has been obtained and a subsequent discount offer must be implemented, which results in a considerable contingency, as the Law establishes that in this type of procedure, prior to a subsequent discount offer, the contract must be awarded to the supplier who offered the greatest benefit derived from the negotiation.
This case constitutes a considerable legal loophole that could generate legal uncertainty, in addition to a zone of opacity, because there are no parameters regulating the negotiation of economic bids between competitors or the scope of the aforementioned benefit.
The creation of ComprasMX
A new digital public procurement platform, ComprasMX, has been planned to replace the system known as CompraNet.
The reform envisages that, with this platform, it will be possible to electronically manage procurement planning, conduct procurement procedures, and monitor the obligations arising from the contracts entered into.
Among the planned features are comprehensive electronic management of procedures; implementation of electronic reverse auctions for certain standardised goods; automatic generation of electronic procurement files; and interoperability with other government systems related to digital identification and electronic signatures.
National content requirement
Similarly, a national content requirement has been established for certain goods purchased by the public sector.
In effect, it is established that, as a general rule, products of national origin must demonstrate a minimum degree of national integration equivalent to 65%.
Before the reform, suppliers could comply with this obligation by making statements under oath. Now, the new system establishes a stricter verification mechanism that requires the submission of detailed documentation on the cost structure of the goods offered.
In addition, the authorities may carry out subsequent checks to verify that the declared national content has in fact been complied with during the execution of the contract.
Monitoring system
A monitoring system has been established to ensure compliance with the required health supplies. This seeks to record and evaluate the performance of suppliers based on orders issued by public institutions.
The system is intended to concentrate information on various performance indicators, including delivery compliance, supply times, and other data relevant to supply management.
Similarly, the system will generate compliance records that contracting authorities can use as a reference when evaluating suppliers' participation in future procurement procedures.
In addition, for transparency, the information generated by this system will be made public.
Significant changes to company participation
At the same time, there have also been significant changes in the way companies participate in public procurement procedures in the area of economic competition.
In July 2025, reforms to the Federal Economic Competition Law were published, expanding the conduct related to monopolistic practices that is punishable under the law.
Among the most relevant modifications is the inclusion of agreements between potential competitors about absolute monopolistic practices, which expands the type of conduct that can be investigated by the authority.
Similarly, the concept of substantial joint power is introduced to evaluate relative monopolistic practices in markets where the co-ordinated conduct of different economic agents may have a restrictive effect on competition.
However, one of the most significant changes is the possibility of imposing sanctions, including temporary disqualification from government procurement procedures, when bid rigging or improper co-ordination between competitors is proved.
Centralisation, discretion and implementation risks
From all of the above, it can be established that the contracting scheme established in the current regulatory framework involves a redistribution of decision-making and execution of actions among the various authorities, so that while the Anti-Corruption and Good Governance Secretariat exercises regulatory control, the SHCP is responsible for the executive function in the most important contracting procedures.
In this sense, it is understandable that there is a desire to reduce the heterogeneity and discretion that previously prevailed in the fragmented scheme of decision-making and execution of contracting procedures. However, the truth is that this new centralised scheme does not solve the problem of discretion; rather, it generalises and homogenises it, even creating bottlenecks that make the system inefficient, at least in some cases.
On the other hand, an important element to consider is the inclusion of additional contracting procedures, which implies the existence - due to the design of these procedures - of more exceptions to public bidding, thereby expanding the space for discretion.
Furthermore, the introduction of the possibility of holding pre-contracting dialogues with interested parties, which involves exchanging information on conditions, prices and specifications, poses significant confidentiality risks and requires the strengthening of rules to mitigate them.
Although it may seem that the aim is to increase flexibility and allow the authorities to gain a deeper understanding of the market, in practice this approach could become a substitute for a formal tendering procedure with rules, in which individuals can exchange information with the authorities, with risks of opacity and to free competition, among others, negotiate the conditions, and, once the conditions have been agreed upon, request quotes via market research that may result in direct awards. In other words, although it was not apparently designed for this purpose, this deviation is a likely consequence.
Furthermore, the confidentiality of the information shared between the authority and the private individual, combined with the possibility of individual dialogues, creates information asymmetries that could constitute undue advantages in terms of economic competition.
Compliance and sector-specific regulation
Another important element of the new procurement scheme is the recognition and inclusion of compliance issues. This includes the certification of compliance programmes in the area of economic competition, and integrity programmes referred to in the Law on Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services.
This represents significant progress, although there are currently no specific parameters to clarify when programmes are valid for the purposes of evaluation in procurement procedures.
Special mention should be made of the procurement of health supplies, where there are various scattered regulatory elements: the Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act; guidelines from the Anti-Corruption and Good Governance Secretariat; the Import Agreement with foreign health registration; new rules on national content; and the decree to promote pharmaceutical investment.
While these scattered regulations imply how complex this sector is, rather than being an adequate systematic response, they appear to be a reaction to various implementation problems that have arisen, especially in recent years.
It is expected that this systematisation will take some time to achieve, so in the short term, the complexity of the regulatory system, at least in the health sector, will entail significant risks of non-compliance by individuals, and require great discretion on the part of the authority in determining not only the suppliers, but also the procurement procedures themselves. The consequent uncertainty this will generate will unfortunately lead to high supply costs and additional supply problems in the public health market.
Conclusion
The main factors of the current public procurement system in Mexico, specifically in the health sector, are:
- there is a centralisation of strategic decisions in public procurement, particularly in sensitive sectors such as health supplies;
- greater flexibility is expected in public procurement procedures, expanding the tools available to authorities and promoting mechanisms for the negotiation and improvement of economic offers;
- progress can be seen in digitalisation, resulting from the use of digital platforms both for conducting procurement procedures and for monitoring contract compliance;
- there is also a focus on encouraging local production, particularly through the introduction of national content requirements for certain goods purchased by the public sector; and
- in terms of economic competition, greater regulatory risks are being introduced for companies participating in public procurement procedures, particularly due to the expansion of punishable conduct and the possibility of imposing disqualifications from contracting with the government when collusion or bid-rigging practices are proved.
Fuentes, notas y citas utilizadas
- Fuente principal: Chambers Global Practice Guides - Public Procurement 2026, Mexico: Trends and Developments, contributed by Fernando Mejía M., Mario Mejía K., Pablo Sandoval D. and Karla Mendoza R., Mejía, Guízar & Kargl, pp. 12-16.
- Fuente editorial adicional: Chambers and Partners, Chambers Global Practice Guides Promotion Kit, disponible en https://marketing.chambers.com/gpg-promotion-kit/. La página recomienda indicar la guía y el área de práctica, destacar el tema del contenido, incluir liga a la guía y utilizar correctamente los activos digitales de Chambers.
- Citas normativas y regulatorias mencionadas en el artículo: Public Sector Procurement, Leasing and Services Act; Federal Economic Competition Law; ComprasMX; CompraNet; SHCP; UNOPS; INSABI; BIRMEX; Anti-Corruption and Good Governance Secretariat; and the framework on national content and pharmaceutical investment. La sección Trends and Developments no contiene notas al pie numeradas en el PDF.
- Nota de republicación: Antes de publicar el texto íntegro en MGK Observatorio, conviene confirmar que la autorización de Chambers and Partners o los términos aplicables permitan la reproducción completa, no sólo la promoción con enlace.
