NASA Eyes Cash Prizes Of Its Own

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.'"

Comments

Early flight was the same

[DonGar]

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

Re:Hmm...

[wass]

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 ;-)