Hi Farzeneh et al–

I had similar questions on a recent call, and we did indeed have some discussion.   To follow up on what was discussed, I had asked for clarification from Staff as to which of the described costs were

1. One time costs (such as R&D) which – having been spent once – won’t occur again.  (in other words, “sunk costs”)
   vs.
2. Ongoing operational costs, which would be steady regardless of volume of requests (in other words, “maintenance” costs”) 
   vs.
3. Incremental costs to ICANN anytime a request is made. 

Staff clarified the estimated expenses, and further clarified which were one time sunk costs, which were ongoing maintenance costs, but just as importantly clarified that there is no (or negligible) incremental cost associated with any new request made.     This is important because it highlights there is opportunity for “economies of scale” to apply in running the RDRS (or SSAD or successor systems);  the higher the volume of requests, the higher the efficiency of the system.  Conversely, when the RDRS has sub-optimal awareness, or sub-optimal utility, or sub-optimal ability to route requests to the full spectrum of data holders (all of which we have discussed to a great extent already), it is at its least efficient. 

In other words;  The ” cost per request” will approach $0 as # of requests approaches infinity.     I find this to be noteworthy.

From: farzaneh badii via Gnso-rdrs-sc <gnso-rdrs-sc@icann.org>
Sent: Monday, June 9, 2025 9:30 AM
To: gnso-rdrs-sc@icann.org
Subject: [EXTERNAL EMAIL] - [Gnso-rdrs-sc] Rdrs is not financially sustainable

Dear team, I am wondering if we are going to talk about the cost of rdrs. So far it has turned out to be very expensive, 2 million dollars. This is not sustainable if each request costs 300 dollars. We need to see where we can cut the cost and recommend to cut costs , otherwise nobody will be able to pay for it and I don’t think ICANN should pay forever! 

Farzaneh