DAVIA vs Tussell

What DAVIA is built for

UK creative, digital and marketing agencies screening official notices against their Company DNA. DAVIA explains GO / CHECK / NO-GO decisions, identifies evidence gaps and organises selected bids into action plans with calendar deadlines. It does not write or submit your bid, or guarantee an award.

Starter is £79/month; Growth is £179/month. Start an account without a card. A card activates the £0 seven-day Starter trial, then £79/month unless cancelled. Public trial availability and VAT treatment are qualified on the pricing page.

What Tussell publishes

Tussell describes public-sector market intelligence covering early buying signals, notices, awards, frameworks, spending and buyer contacts. Its stated uses include sizing a market, researching buyer spend, tracking incumbent suppliers and building relationships before a tender appears. Tussell explicitly says it is not a bid-management or AI bid-writing tool.

Tussell offers annual subscriptions with pricing that varies by tier, modules and integrations. Its plans page asks visitors to talk to sales; it does not publish a fixed price for a like-for-like comparison.

Which fits your next step?

Consider DAVIA for agency-fit decisions and the practical response workflow. Consider Tussell when your team needs wider market sizing, account research, incumbent tracking and early buying intelligence. These tools address different jobs; one is not a substitute for every function of the other.

What a year costs at published prices

On monthly billing, twelve months of DAVIA Starter is £948 and Growth is £2,148. Tussell does not publish a price, so a yearly figure for it can only come from a quote. When you ask for one, ask which modules, users and integrations are included, so you compare like with like.

An example: a 10-person digital agency

This is an illustration, not a customer story. A 10-person agency wants to bid on four to six public contracts a year. Its main problem is choosing which notices are worth a bid and then organising the work to the deadline. A tool focused on agency fit, bid/no-bid verdicts and action plans matches that job. If the same agency instead wanted to map every council’s marketing spend, see which suppliers hold current contracts and plan sales activity a year ahead, Tussell’s published market, spend and buyer-contact intelligence would be the closer fit.

Some teams use both kinds of tool: one for long-range market research and one for the week-to-week decision about which bids to write.

Questions to ask before you choose

• Which UK sources does the tool search, and does it include the devolved portals you need?
• Does it explain why a notice matches your agency, or only that a keyword appeared?
• How many users are included, and what does an extra seat cost?
• Can you cancel monthly, or is the contract annual?
• Does it help after you decide to bid, with tasks, deadlines and documents?
• What happens to the company information and documents you upload?

How to test both fairly

Pick one real week of notices and run the same check in each tool. Write down the three or four services your agency actually sells, your usual contract size and the regions you can deliver in. Then count how many notices each tool shows you, how many of those you would genuinely consider bidding for, and how long it took to reach a decision on each one. A tool that shows fewer notices but saves you from reading irrelevant ones may be worth more than one that shows everything.

Also test the step after the decision. Choose one notice you would bid for and see whether the tool helps you list the documents, set deadlines and share the work with colleagues, or whether that still happens in email and spreadsheets.

When neither tool is the answer

If your agency bids once or twice a year, the free official services (Find a Tender, Contracts Finder and the devolved portals) with saved alerts may be enough. If the problem is missing evidence, such as case studies, insurance or accreditations, no software will close that gap; preparing that material first will do more for your next bid.

Questions

Are the prices directly comparable?

No. Coverage, allowances, integrations and tax treatment differ. Check each provider’s current terms before buying; the prices above are a dated account of their published pages, not a total-cost estimate.

Will any platform guarantee a contract win?

DAVIA does not. Always check the official tender pack, eligibility, evaluation criteria and your capacity before committing to a bid.

This comparison is written by DAVIA, not an independent review or an endorsement by Tussell. Features and prices can change.