It shows where you landed against competitors, how the field priced individual items, and which line items tend to run high or low. Estimators study past bid tabs to sharpen unit pricing and read the market before the next pursuit.
Public bids are opened and read aloud, so the tabulation is a matter of public record. Many agencies post it within days of opening. Compared against the engineer's estimate, a bid tab also shows whether the whole field came in high or low. That is a useful read on how aggressively competitors are chasing work and where your pricing sits relative to the market. Nonlinear analyzes historical bid tabs to surface pricing patterns, competitive positioning, and margin clues for comparable jobs.
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