Is it possible to win a bid purely on your ability to meet the requirement?

My opinion is that it isn’t.

In my industry (education/public sector) it’s important for establishments to engage in a fair procurement process, so the ability to meet a technical requirement will score you points.

However, I personally don’t think you’re in the running if you don’t have a relationship with the customer, understand what’s important to them and know why you’re bidding. There’s so much more to it than what’s written in the product spec. It’s your job as a business to understand that. Relationships are everything.

Still, a lot of companies in the sector insist on bidding anyway as they think they have a chance based on requirement alone. To them their product is king (they’re also the people who think “the product sells itself”) but more often than not they’re just pouring their money/resource away.

What do you think?