Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Destination Request for Information

1. OVERVIEW

NASA is seeking information from commercial providers and industry to help shape the future acquisition strategy for Commercial LEO Destinations to maintain America’s presence in LEO.  

This RFI is aligned with the Executive Order “Ensuring American Space Superiority” (December 2025), which directs the United States to: 

• Grow a vibrant commercial space economy through the power of American free enterprise by spurring private sector initiative and a commercial pathway to replace the International Space Station

Building a replacement for the ISS is a national imperative to maintain an orbital laboratory and proving ground in LEO.  When the International Space Station reaches its planned end-of-life, NASA will transition to commercially provided space stations.  NASA is evaluating two options for this transition: a direct to commercial station option and an incrementally phased transition. 

The direct to commercial station approach is aligned with NASA’s original plan which relied on NASA being one of many providers with 2 space stations offering commercial services.  Given that the current commercial market is not mature and with available funding, NASA is not able to fund 2 commercial space stations to maintain competition and redundancy.  NASA’s new alternate approach of using an incrementally phased transition allows for continued participation from multiple providers and a continued competitive drive to grow the commercial market.  Reference the supplemental Concept of Operations and the LEO New Approach Acquisition for the new approach.

Industry has already provided significant feedback on the original option including methods for procurement.  In light of NASA considering two options, NASA would like comparative input for these options.   

2. REQUESTED INFORMATION

Information provided will be used solely for internal Government planning, market research, and acquisition strategy development purposes. NASA will not publicly release company-specific data or estimates. Any external communication data will be aggregated, anonymized, and non-attributable.  Response to questions in Section A.

A. Commercial Market Growth Indicators

1. What are the key market demand areas (e.g. tourism, manufacturing in space, media, R&D, etc.) that drive the Commercialization of LEO?

a. What are the market drivers, research breakthroughs, technological improvement that will lead to market breakthroughs in LEO?

b. What can enable these drivers to come to fruition?

c. Will these market areas change over time and when do you anticipate these changes?

d. What source of demand do you forecast for these markets (e.g. US Government, Private Industry, Foreign Government)?

e. What indicators do you believe can be used to predict when a self-sustaining market can be reached?

2. Is there additional independently verifiable data on market demands that you want NASA to include in its strategy for LEO replacement station?

3. Describe your required investment, phasing, anticipated contributions (by area) and funding approach over time to enable design, development, test and evaluation, sustaining, and operations of your commercial platform.

a. Identify whether NASA funding is critical, enabling, or supplemental to your approach.

b. Describe how your development approach would change considering the currently available NASA budget.

4. Identify key transportation assumptions used to enable your business case, including:

a. Anticipated cost environment

b. Availability of providers

c. Flight cadence and long-term traffic model for crew and cargo transportation

5. What are the top items that industry would like to see NASA implement on ISS to improve the ability to ignite markets in LEO?

a. NASA has changed the Private Astronaut Mission (PAM) Commander Seat policy and will now allow for sale of the seat to a first-time flyer.  Would NASA purchase of a seat or pursuing a joint commercial/NASA combined mission be beneficial to industry?

b. What other areas does industry see as critical for market growth (e.g. InSPA, commercial cargo missions, etc.)?

6. How do the above answers differ between the original concept and alternative approach?

7.  What percent cost offset do you expect to need for the commercial module?

8. Overall commercial space station end-to-end service costs include amortization of development costs, sustaining and infrastructure costs, and transportation costs.  Transportation costs represent the majority of the SOMD ISS budget and are paid directly to the crew and cargo providers and would exist regardless of going to ISS or a future commercial station. 

a. What assumption is industry making about the end-to-end service costs that NASA and other customers will be willing to pay for use of a new commercial station? 

b. If you expect savings over the ISS transportation costs, what are they and where should NASA and other space agencies look for the associated savings? 

c. How does the assumed cost amortize the development and sustaining cost across all customers such that all customers pay a fair share in their seat/services cost? 

Responses to the Request for Information (RFI) questions in the remaining Sections B- H are for planning purposes only and will be used by NASA to inform and support the development of future acquisition strategies, requirements, and potential solicitations.  Do not submit answers marked proprietary, confidential, or competition-sensitive information in response to this section

B. Architectural Needs to support Market Maturation

1. What are the key drivers and features in a LEO architecture to support investment, market growth and expansion?

2. What commercial opportunities are present for a commercial module attached to the core module prior to and after ISS separation?

3. What are the key functions, resources and services that the Core Module can provide to Commercial modules to enable commercial goals?

4. What are other ideas for continuing to promote commercial growth in this concept?  What other architectural features could make this more commercially forward and profitable?

5. In the architecture, does it make sense to consider a commercial bus that multiple modules could use versus each commercial module providing their own propulsion, etc.?

C. Procurement Approach

1. Should NASA release the solicitation for both the Core Module and the Commercial Modules at the same time or stagger the release of the RFPs to allow industry time to respond properly? Please explain.

2. Please identify your company’s level of interest in supplying Core Module.

a. Describe and provide the rationale for a desired contract type(s).  Are there any contract types that prevent you from bidding?

b. Address any known risks and/or benefits associated with your company’s recommended arrangement and provide any appropriate mitigation techniques?

3. In reference to LEO New Approach Acquisition, for the Core Module what ideas do you have that would result in a cost offset to NASA and benefits to industry?

4. In reference to LEO New Approach Acquisition, please identify your company’s level of interest in entering a partnership with NASA for a Commercially owned and operated Commercial Module?

a. What kind of partnership would industry recommend? Specifically,

i. Type of Partnership

ii. Length of Partnership

iii. Industry Contribution

iv. NASA Contribution

v. Type of contract

vi. Contract milestones

vii. Approach to requirements, data deliverables, data rights

5. What can NASA do to reduce barriers to entry and to maximize competition?

D. Technical Approach

1. Provide technical feedback for the Concept of Operations, please provide the following feedback

a. What are the key architectural drivers for cost and schedule?  What modifications would you recommend to reduce technical complexity, cost and schedule?

b. For providers who have been developing space modules and systems, how much of your current development is compatible with this proposed architecture?

E. Supply Chain Management and Challenges

1. Please summarize what you see as the biggest supply chain risks (e.g. shortage of vendors, insufficient options, industry capacity, etc.) to minimize critical path and/or significant cost impacts.

2. What are the barriers to using alternate supply chains or suppliers?

a. Are there clauses or requirements levied by NASA that compound the challenge of establishing alternate supply chains or suppliers?

F. Requirements and Design, Development, Test and Evaluation (DDT&E) Approach

1. How can NASA streamline requirements to accelerate development and certification?

2. What barriers are there to realize high Technology Readiness Level (TRL) and high reliability hardware that will enable launching the core and subsequent modules as soon as possible?  How would you ensure early testing and suitability for relevant environments and operating scenarios?  

3. What enabling approaches could be used to perform early and rapid requirements refinement, early testing/risk buy down and certification.  What successful examples have demonstrated this?

4. What can NASA do to incentivize rapid product development and certification, use of high TRL, high reliability (e.g. existing hardware) with minimal new development/modifications?

a. What should the contract include to hold vendors accountable and incentivize this through the life cycle?

5. What can NASA do to incentivize vendor tailoring of NASA System Engineering Process and Requirements (NPR 7123.1d) to leverage an iterative design approach and early development testing to aid in high TRL component selection and rapidly validate design/requirements decomposition while maintaining design integrity principles/milestones?

G. Standards

1. Which government technical standards (e.g. workmanship) are considered out of date by commercial industry and should be changed for this procurement? What are key NASA standards that drive high cost, long schedules or supply chain limitations?  What aspect drives these impacts. 

2. What can NASA do to incentivize and/or require using alternate industry standards where they meet or exceed NASA standards to maximize the use of existing industry capability and processes? 

3. What would you recommend changing in NASA’s approach to human rating to reduce complexity while maintaining high reliability and crew safety?   Ref:  NASA Std 8719.29 and NPR 8705.2C.

H. GFS/GFE/GTA

1. What help do you need from NASA and what Government Furnished Services (GFS), Government Furnished Equipment (GFE) and/or Government Task Orders (GTA) would you anticipate needing?

3. SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS 

Submissions should adhere to the following guidelines: 

• Responses must be submitted electronically in PDF format to ashley.h.chaves@nasa.gov  no later than April 08, 2026, at 11:59 PM EST. 

• File Format: PDF only 

• File Naming Convention: "OrganizationName_LEODestinationRFI.pdf" 

• Provide Organization name, address, and point of contact information 

• No Page Limits 

• Respondents will receive a confirmation email upon successful submission 

• Export controlled information should not be included in RFI responses

• Responses to this RFI will not be shared publicly and will be used solely for internal NASA planning purposes

• If proprietary data is included, NASA may use it for internal planning purposes which may result in future competitive acquisitions

4. DISCLAIMER 

This RFI is issued solely for information-gathering and planning purposes only. It does not constitute a solicitation or a commitment by the government to procure any services. This is not a request for proposal or quotation, nor is this a solicitation for a contract or grant award. This RFI does not obligate the Government in any way. The Government will not reimburse the respondents for any costs associated with the information submitted in response to this request.   

No corresponding solicitation exists; therefore, do not request a copy of the solicitation. If a solicitation following this is released, it will be posted on www.sam.gov (https://www.sam.gov/). It is the interested party’s responsibility to monitor this site for the release of any solicitation or synopsis.   

5. POINTS OF CONTACT

For questions regarding this RFI, please email ashley.h.chaves@nasa.gov