A purchaser at a research laboratory is working with scientists on a purchase agreement for a new generation of chemical analytic instrumentation. There is general agreement that a new instrument of this type can be made to perform to the extreme precision and sensitivity desired, but that such an instrument does not at present exist. The engineers at a major supplier believe that they can achieve this new level of precision with information given to them by the research laboratory staff.
The supplier requests a sizeable down payment for the order: 50% of total purchase cost of $1 million. In order to achieve the MOST benefit, how should the research laboratory defining its purchase requirements?