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NASA Eyes Cash Prizes Of Its Own

Posted by timothy on from the some-clown-on-the-moon dept.

joeldg writes "Wired is reporting that NASA is considering offering cash prizes for space innovation. 'Lembeck said NASA would consider offering $10 million to $30 million in prizes to encourage private investors to develop space vehicles. Such prizes appear compatible with the vision for space exploration released last week by a White House commission that studied President Bush's plan to send Americans back to the moon and possibly to Mars.'"

5 of 289 comments (clear)

  1. Early flight was the same by DonGar · · Score: 4, Informative

    Much of the advancement in early flight was related to similar contests of the time.

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    plus-good, double-plus-good
  2. Re:One Question by shadow_slicer · · Score: 3, Informative

    If you're hoping they'll convert newtons to pounds for you you're out of luck.

    But they might be able to give you a league for your foot.

  3. Re:Hmm... by wass · · Score: 4, Informative
    Would it be cheaper than NASA developing the same things in-house?

    I used to work on a DARPA-funded project, and I can tell you - almost certainly.

    There has been a push w/ governmental agencies, including NASA, to use COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf) products. A private company researches and develops a certain product product (which NASA could do as well), but can then sell the products to a variety of outlets for profit (which NASA is forbidden to do). So NASA buying a one-off of a COTS component pays only a fraction of the R&D cost that the company spent making it.

    As an example, I know of a group that needed a very linear high-bandwidth op-amp for a project. Such an op-amp within their specs didn't exist, so they began the intensive effort of designing one themselves. Halftway through the process another company (maybe Burr-Brown? I forget) put a device on the market that did meet their specs. Although they spent time/money on the research, they still saved out in the end because they just bought and used that op-amp without wasting further development efforts.

    The big win for COTS comes from the fact that NASA and other governmental agencies and labs CANNOT sell products for profit, but private companies CAN. For example, the lab I worked in (not my group, though) did alot of radar research. After proving new radar concepts would work, companies like Lockheed-Martin or Raytheon would go and build many of them, making millions of $$$ for themselves. Such is the life of research ;-)

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    make world, not war

  4. NASA's Centennial Challenges Program by FleaPlus · · Score: 3, Informative

    Here's the official and wikipedia links to information on NASA's Centennial Challenges Program, which is what the article is presumably referring to. The contests haven't been decided on yet, but currently things like "very low cost spacecraft missions", "breakthrough robotic capability competitions", and "revolutionary technology demonstrations" are under consideration.

    Speaking of, has anybody heard about what happened at the Centennial Challenges Workshop on June 15-16? I haven't been able to find any reports on it. Hopefully at least one slashdotter attended...

  5. Re:cash prize, like.. the X-Prize? by DAldredge · · Score: 3, Informative

    Because NASA has a lot of overhead (the goverment uses NASA to funnel support to our aerospace industry, like food stamps is used to subsidize our farmers and grocery industry. It doesn't upset the WTO).

    IOW, NASA's base cost would be 50%-500% more than a small companies. That is where the cost savings comes from. And don't forget, NASA doesn't really build anything, the subcontract most of that work out to large aerospace corps.