Why Suppliers Provide Fixed Bid Projects
There are only two reasons why a supplier should enter into a fixed bid project. Here they are.
Reason 1
A supplier enters into a fixed cost project because they have a very good chance of beating their estimates for the work and therefore stand to make money on the project. Of course this hinges upon being able to fairly accurate about estimates which also means that they need to have delivered this type of project before or something very similar... successfully of course.. and preferably many times so that a repeatable process is known and well documented.
Reason 2
A supplier may decide to "buy business" as an investment. In other words they think they can get more business and make more money in the long run by breaking even or even losing some money on an initial project in order to win additional business later. Of course this should only be done if the client has significantly deep pockets and future business is very lucrative.