What does RFT mean in US Government?

Request for tender

A request for tenders (RFT) is a formal, structured invitation to suppliers to submit a bid to supply products or services. In the public sector an official fee is needed to fortify and secure the tender bid engagement/win documents, such a process may be required and determined in detail by law to ensure that such competition for the use of public funds is open, fair and free from bribery and nepotism. For example, a government may put a building project 'out to tender'; that is, publish an invitation for other parties to make a proposal for the building's construction, on the understanding that any competition for the relevant government contract must be conducted in response to the tender, no parties having the unfair advantage of separate, prior, closed-door negotiations for the contract. An evaluation team will go through the tenders and decide who will get the contract.As a consequence of the scale of the tender process the majority of RFTs are published by the government sector, but companies in the infrastructure and utilities sectors may also publish RFTs.

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