José Luis Delgado Davara, CEO and founder of Mottum Analytica and Noetia

We spoke with José Luis Delgado Davara, CEO & Founder of Mottum Analytica and Noetia, two initiatives created with the aim of making it easier for technology companies and startups to access the public procurement market, combining expert knowledge with the use of specialized artificial intelligence.

Throughout the conversation, he reflects on the lessons learned after years of working with governments in more than 20 countries and multilateral organizations, debunks some of the most widespread myths about public tenders, and explains how public procurement of innovation can become a real pathway to market access, funding, and validation for entrepreneurial teams. He also addresses the balance between automation and human judgment, the most common mistakes made when starting to bid, and the most effective strategies for building trust in the B2G space.

You worked with governments in more than 20 countries and multilateral banks before founding Noetia and Mottum. What do you think tech founders underestimate when dealing with the public sector, and what lesson from that stage have you brought directly into your startups? 

One of the most underestimated aspects is probably the true size of the market. In Spain, the public sector moves very large procurement volumes: in 2025 alone, public tendering reached €180.6 billion, 32% more than the previous year. Internationally, multilateral organizations such as the World Bank, the IDB, and the United Nations publish thousands of opportunities every quarter.

We are therefore looking at an enormous, predictable market with clear rules. However, many startups do not even consider it because they perceive it as slow, excessively bureaucratic, or inaccessible. That knowledge is precisely one of the assets we have been able to capitalize on at Mottum: while other teams were competing for the same private clients in highly saturated markets, we chose to build relationships with public administrations in more than eight countries and learn to speak their language.

The most direct lesson we have brought into the startup world is that the public sector does not buy technology in the abstract, but rather solutions to concrete problems, backed by proven experience. And that completely transforms the way you design your value proposition, structure your teams, and prioritize your first contracts.  

How can startups make the most of public procurement of innovation —including instruments such as PCP and PPI— as a route to market access, funding, and validation for their solutions?

Public procurement of innovation is surely one of the most undervalued entry points for a startup. Instruments such as PCP (Pre-Commercial Procurement) and PPI (Public Procurement of Innovation) are specifically designed so that public administrations can contract solutions that do not yet formally exist on the market. 

This removes one of the classic barriers: needing prior experience to win a contract, but being unable to gain that experience without having won one first.

For an entrepreneurial team, these instruments provide access to non-dilutive funding, institutional validation, and the possibility of having a first reference client that opens many doors afterward.

The recommendation, in this regard, is clear: map public procurement of innovation calls within your own sector and approach public-sector clients not with a product pitch, but with a concrete proposal on how to solve a problem that the administration has already identified.

Many startups dismiss tenders as too complex. What are the three barriers that really hold back a tech SME, and what practical tactics do you recommend to overcome them without a large business development team?

The first major barrier is fear of documentary complexity. Public tender specifications can easily exceed 200 pages, with cross-references to regulations, solvency criteria, and highly specific technical requirements. However, that complexity is also where technology makes a difference. 

At Mottum we developed Noetia, an artificial intelligence platform trained specifically on the Public Sector Contracts Law, capable of analyzing tender documents, identifying disqualifying requirements, and generating technical proposals tailored to each company’s context. Processes that once required between 40 and 80 hours of senior work can now be resolved in a fraction of that time.

The second barrier is the lack of references and proven solvency. In these cases, the best strategy is usually to start as a partner or collaborator with companies that already bid for public contracts, which allows you to learn the process, accumulate experience, and share risks.

The third barrier is the lack of specific training. Public procurement has its own rules and its own language. To overcome it, it is essential to get trained, rely on specialized tools, and automate everything that does not provide differentiation. For small teams, the key is to outsource the initial detection and analysis phases and focus human talent on strategy and technical storytelling.

Imagine a 10-person SaaS startup with zero experience in public tenders. If it wanted to submit a bid this quarter, what 3- or 4-point checklist of concrete actions would you give it to get started without getting stuck?

The first step is to assume that bidding and winning is not immediate, but that timelines can be significantly shortened with the right strategy. A practical approach would involve four phases: opportunity scouting, small contracts to gain experience, partner search, and progressive bid preparation.

Before anything else, it is essential to have alert services that systematically show what is moving in the public sector. From there, it makes sense to start with small contracts, where the bureaucratic burden is lower.

The next step is to identify trusted partners to bid alongside, share solvency, and learn during execution. Every completed contract adds experience and references. Finally, once that path has been covered, it is time to prepare your own proposals, relying on specialized AI tools and always with human oversight.

What is the most costly mistake —in time or money— that a startup usually makes in its first tenders, and how can it be avoided without a consulting budget?

The most costly mistake is starting to bid without a clear strategy or applying to opportunities that, in reality, cannot be won. It is usually not a problem of lack of ambition, but of poor prioritization.

Before starting to write a technical proposal, it is essential to analyze the disqualifying criteria in the tender documents and compare them with the company’s real profile. If those requirements are not met, the most efficient decision is not to proceed. And if they are met, it is advisable to carefully study the distribution of points between automatic criteria and criteria subject to value judgment, in order to decide whether there is a real chance to compete.

The public sector is slow, but secure. The secret is not to be bold at any price, but to be selective: start small, win, accumulate references, and scale from there.

At Noetia, you have integrated AI into tasks such as tender analysis and technical proposal writing. From the perspective of a startup with limited resources, in which phases of a tender is it worth investing in tools, and where is human judgment more valuable?

Artificial intelligence is especially valuable in two phases: searching for and filtering opportunities, and the initial evaluation of tender documents. A startup may receive hundreds of alerts each month, many of them irrelevant. A specialized AI system can filter out that noise in seconds and show only the opportunities where there is a real possibility of competing.

This frees the team from mechanical tasks and allows them to focus their efforts on strategic decisions. And that is where human judgment remains essential: in defining strategy, managing relationships with key stakeholders, and creating real differentiation in the proposal.

Introducing technology into such a bureaucratic and regulated sector is complex. What was the biggest challenge in earning the trust of your first public-sector clients, and what validation strategy would you recommend to any B2G founder?

The main challenge was proving that a young technology company could deliver with the rigor required by the public sector. And the best validation strategy for any B2G founder is precisely not to try to convince with a startup-style narrative, but with facts.

Start as a technology partner of organizations that already have the public buyer’s trust, execute with excellence, and let the results speak for themselves. In parallel, obtaining the certifications the sector requires helps remove many objections before they even arise.

In the public sector, trust is built contract by contract, not through sales presentations.

If you had to leave entrepreneurs with three practical recommendations to sell better to the public sector or multilateral organizations, what would they be?

The first would be to shorten the mental sales cycle. There is an idea that selling to the public sector takes years, but if you choose the right opportunities, it is possible to close a first contract in just a few months. The key is selectivity.

The second recommendation is to personalize each proposal as much as possible. The public sector does not buy generic products, but concrete solutions to specific problems. Every bid should be written as if that organization were your only client.

And the third is knowledge. Understanding the regulations, timelines, priorities, and constraints of the public buyer is a competitive advantage that no technology can replace.

In short: be selective, be specific, and know the buyer better than anyone else.