Comparison
economAIcs vs Altura
One automates complex bids across eight industries in Europe. One does a single industry, in one procurement system, to the bone. Here's the honest difference.
If you're a public transport operator or supplier and Altura has crossed your radar (it should have; they're good), this page will save you a demo cycle.
Read this if
You're a Commercial Director, Bid Director or Head of BD in bus, rail, ferry or transport tech. Your tenders live on Find a Tender and Contracts Finder, your world is shaped by DfT, franchising and BSIP, and you're working out whether "AI for bids" means workflow automation, or sector judgement.
What Altura is: credit where due
Altura is one of the most capable bid platforms in Europe. Founded in 2019 in the Netherlands, backed by ~€12m including an €8m Series A led by Octopus Ventures, it automates the lifecycle of complex, multi-stakeholder tenders: tender analysis, requirements extraction, risk analysis, clarification questions, pre-submission compliance checks, all feeding a shared "Bid Book". Its source-traceability is genuinely strong: findings link back to the source document, with human approval gates. Enterprise names like BAM, ISS, Securitas, EY and Adecco use it, and they publish customer results that include real win-rate improvements.
If you're a large, multi-industry bid function running complex European tenders, Altura deserves its shortlist place. That's not us being polite. It's true.
What economAIcs is
economAIcs does one thing Altura doesn't list: transport. Altura's site names eight industries: facilities, utilities, HR services, consultancy, infrastructure, catering, business services, construction. Transport isn't one of them, and it shows in the work: no patronage thinking, no service economics, no franchising context, no DfT procurement language.
economAIcs was built by a founder who has personally bid 500+ transport tenders and won £250m+. It finds public transport opportunities, gives you a scored, evidence-cited bid/no-bid verdict, then helps write the response in the language public transport evaluators actually reward, and it learns from every outcome.
The difference in one sentence: Altura structures complex bids brilliantly. economAIcs decides and wins transport bids, because it only does transport.
Side by side
| Altura | economAIcs | |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | Complex multi-stakeholder tenders across 8 industries, transport not among them | Public transport only: bus, rail, ferry, transport tech & consulting |
| Home market | Netherlands-headquartered, Benelux-first, expanding into the UK | Native to Find a Tender, Contracts Finder, DfT, franchising, BSIP |
| Bid/no-bid | Surfaces criteria and risks, structured decision support | Scored verdict with drivers and evidence you can put in front of a board |
| Sector knowledge | Your documents, configured to your criteria | Transport procurement encoded: evaluator behaviour, service economics, DfT language, plus your documents |
| Truth discipline | Word-level source links, human approval, genuinely strong | Truth Gate: every claim cited, every figure flagged for human confirmation, plus transport-calibrated sanity checks on the numbers |
| Learning loop | Dashboards and bid insights | Wins and losses feed the verdict engine, the next bid starts smarter |
| Pricing | Tier names published, prices not: quote on request, 3-user minimum, annual contracts | Published on our site: Brain Deployment from £5,000 + £500/month; bid consulting at a fixed fee per bid, no day rates |
| Data residency | EU/EEA-hosted, ISO 27001, GDPR | Dedicated deployment, zero training on client data |
| Who's behind it | Strong European product team built around bid expertise | Founder with 500+ transport tenders bid, £250m+ won, the experience is in the product |
When Altura is the right choice
Choose Altura if:
- You're an enterprise bid function bidding acrossseveral industries, not just transport
- Your pain is coordination at scale, dozens of SMEs, legal, finance, hundreds of requirements per tender
- You operate mainly in Benelux or wider Europe, where their market presence is deepest
- You have the team size for a 3-user minimum and an enterprise procurement cycle
No hard feelings. Different tool, different job.
When economAIcs is the right choice
Choose economAIcs if:
- Your world is public transport procurement, and you want a platform that already speaks it, not one you have to teach
- The expensive failure mode isn't messy coordination, it's bidding the wrong tender or submitting an unverified number
- You want a board-ready bid/no-bid verdict, scored and evidenced, before committing writing resource
- You're a £5m–£500m operator who wants a published price and a start this month, not a scoped enterprise rollout
- You want your bid history working for you, in your sector's terms, from day one
The £500k question
This company exists because a transport director nearly submitted a bid with an AI-invented "average driver salary", 7% off financial truth, £500,000 of downside. Generic tools structure documents; they don't know when a transport number is wrong. Every figure in economAIcs passes a Truth Gate calibrated to transport before it goes near a submission.
FAQ
Is economAIcs a replacement for Altura?
In public transport, yes, discovery, qualification, drafting and post-bid learning, sector-native. Across multiple other industries, no: Altura is the stronger generalist for complex multi-sector bid functions.
Does Altura cover transport tenders?
Altura is industry-configurable, but transport is not among the eight industries they publish, and the platform carries no transport-specific intelligence, no franchising context, patronage logic or DfT language. It can structure a transport bid; it can't advise one.
Why does economAIcs publish pricing when Altura doesn't?
Different models. Altura scopes enterprise deployments with a 3-user minimum. We publish prices (Brain Deployment from £5,000 + £500/month, fixed-fee bid consulting) because transport operators plan budgets and we'd rather earn trust before the first call.
Is Altura's source-tracing the same as the Truth Gate?
It's close in spirit and genuinely good, findings link to source documents. The Truth Gate goes further for transport: claims are cited, figures are flagged for human sign-off, and numbers are sanity-checked against transport-calibrated reality before submission.
How do we test economAIcs without a procurement exercise?
Start with the free Bid Mechanics Diagnostic, nine questions, a personalised report on where your bid process leaks. Then book a walkthrough on a live tender.
Built by someone who's sat where you sit, 500+ tenders bid, £250m+ won.
Read the field guide: How to choose AI bid software for transport →
Sources
- Altura funding: €8m Series A led by Octopus Ventures, ~€12m total, altura.io blog + Octopus/Fortino/Curiosity announcements (June 2025).
- Industries list (8, no transport): altura.io footer + industry pages, checked 2026-07-03.
- Pricing structure (tiers without prices, 3-user minimum, annual, onboarding fees possible): altura.io/prijzen + pricing FAQ, checked 2026-07-03.
- Capability & traceability description: altura.io platform/workflow pages, checked 2026-07-03.
- Customers: logos and testimonials on altura.io (BAM, ISS, Securitas, Acolad, Bidfood, Athlon; EY/Adecco/Ricoh per press).
- economAIcs pricing: economaicsgroup.com/pricing (live).