One contract, 6.6 million manats, two districts — how Baku's 3D map was procured
A 6,581,396.92 AZN LiDAR mapping contract for 167 km² of Baku was signed on 26 December 2023, five days before the new procurement law took effect, through a "request for proposals" procedure. Five questions from open data.
On 26 December 2023 the procuring entity, the Cadastre and Land Management Design and Research Centre LLC ("Kadastr və Yerquruluşu Layihə-Tədqiqat Mərkəzi" MMC), a structure of the State Service for Property Issues under the Ministry of Economy, signed a contract with 4Maps Bilgi Teknolojileri LLC for LiDAR aerial mapping of two districts of Baku. The contract was published on 27 December 2023. The new Law on Public Procurement took effect on 1 January 2024.
The facts from the portal
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Contract value | 6,581,396.92 AZN (about US$3.9 million) |
| Procedure | "Request for proposals" (təkliflər sorğusu) |
| Area | Binagadi 147 km² + Narimanov 20 km² = 167 km² |
| Implied price | about 39,400 AZN per km² (author's calculation) |
| Contractor's prior largest state contract | 3.73 million AZN (2022) |
| Contractor's state contracts in the AZTender corpus | about 10.7 million AZN across 4 contracts, 2021–2023 |
The contractor is a resident of the Sumgayit Chemical Industrial Park, managed by the Economic Zones Development Agency, which is also under the Ministry of Economy.
Five questions
- Timing. Why was the contract signed five days before the new law took effect?
- Procedure. Why a "request for proposals" for a contract of this size?
- Ecosystem. Both buyer and contractor sit within structures of the same ministry. What does that mean for competition?
- Method. Drone-based LiDAR over 167 km² of dense city: what specification was published?
- Price. What does 39,400 AZN per km² buy, and who owns the resulting data?
This article makes no legal determination. Every fact above sits in open data; the questions are about what the data does not show. The analysis was first published on 21 August 2026 on LinkedIn and in the Economy Digest newsletter.
