2.4 In its instructions to its bid evaluation team, the Department specified that it wanted the team to gauge whether each bidder had appreciated the complex requirements associated with the laboratories. The Department received two bids for the project: one from Laser and the other from a consortium called Osborne. The team concluded that neither bidder had demonstrated specifically how it would meet the stringent temperature controls required in some of the laboratory spaces. The team suggested that a single laboratory should be selected and the bidders asked to work up their designs. The Department did not follow up the idea.
2.5 The bid evaluation team also considered that Laser had underestimated how tough meeting the most stringent temperature control requirements would be and had not made sufficient space available in its design for the machinery needed to maintain the specified environmental conditions. However, the Department did not demand from Laser detailed plans for addressing these concerns.