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Biologist, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Biologist and Payload integrator, Editor of NASAWatch.com and Astrobiology.com, Lapsed climber, Explorer, Synaesthete, Former Challenger Center board member... More by Keith Cowing
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We started to bid on a CASIS solicitation for experiments to be flown on ISS. CASIS directed bidders to use either Nanoracks or Teledyne Brown for experiment accommodation services. There was a maximum award of $500K. The quote from the directed accommodation service providers was $300K – 60% of the maximum available award. We declined to bid. We notified CASIS about the no-win constraint they impose, but got no response, not even a courtesy response.
CASIS is just inept. No other explanation.
Your story needs to be made part of a broad investigative report into the work of CASIS. This is a near-criminal waste of the investment of talent and treasure that went into creating and goes into maintaining ISS.
Nanoracks has direct NASA support. For most of the experiments that fly on ISS the actual Nanoracks or Teledyne accomodations are part of the award. The user provides a payload that can fit in the Nanoracks accommodation. The user does have some expenses such as fabricating the payload itself, but once the materials, dimensions, safety and power constraints are understood this is not usually any more expensive than a comparable system for ground use.