Systematic discrimination and lack of professionalism & transparency
Unfortunately, the EU outsourced all Copernicus Ocean work to this company. Their public tenders run via a French government portal (although it is EU money), which is available in French only (of course - with France being France), so the process clearly and systematically discriminates against non-French speakers.
You get no feedback on your submitted proposals (like you would get a consensus report from EU), which is a clear breach of EU transparency rules. From what I have seen, they tend to award projects to the highest bidder, which does not instill confidence that they are good custodians of EU money.
When they do award you a project, they don't pay in time and then bully you into foregoing your right to late interest payment, along the lines of "if you ever want to be awarded a project from us again, you better not claim interest" (although they paid you 5 months late for no apparent reason but their own incompetence).
So overall, it is a shame that these clowns are put in charge of something as important as the Copernicus Ocean projects. The EU should move these projects to more professional organisations such as ECMWF or EumetSat. They would do a much better job.








