Background. The US government established the SBIR program under the Small Business Innovation Development Act of 1982. Federal agencies with extramural research and development budgets exceeding $100 Million are required to allocate 3.2% of this extramural R&D budget to fund small businesses through the SBIR program. This amounts to a very large amount of funding available to small businesses – in total more than $54.3 Billion in awards have been made to small businesses through FY2019.
Getting Funding. The participating agencies (NIH, NSF, etc.) put out solicitations for proposals throughout the year with several submission deadlines throughout the year. The solicitations may require proposals to be responsive to a particular topic (e.g. Department of Energy). The National Science Foundation (NSF) has a wide range of topics for which an appropriate topical area can usually be easily found. The application process involves preparation of a proposal package that contains a detailed description of the technical merits and research plans for the project, and importantly also a commercial merit component. The volume for these proposals ranges from 10 to 30 pages depending on the agency and the phase (first or second) of the project. A variety of supporting documents including a complying budget and justification needs to be furnished.
Funding Levels. Grants are usually structured into two phases supported by government funding plus additional commercialization that typically is no longer financially supported by the government. The first phase is smaller in size ranging from 150 thousand dollars to 250 thousand dollars and is focused on establishing the feasibility and ground work for the project. The more substantial second phase can approach a million dollars (or even more in some cases).
Success Rates. Depending on the agency, success rates are typically in the 10-15 percent range. Unfortunately, the vast majority of submitted proposals are rejected because the proposal has material technical or merit defects. Well written, responsive proposals with clear technical and commercial merit have a much higher rate of success. Caribbean Waters only accepts support for proposals that carry the necessary merit and we ensure that the submitted proposals are best-of-class. The success rate for our proposals is very high and close to 100% including re-submissions.
Getting Support from Caribbean Waters. Our support ranges from just providing templates and guidance to participation in the creation and editing of the proposal all the way to leading a proposal submission with minimal time commitment by the small business. Our experienced team has raised more than 15 Million dollars of SBIR funding over the last 2 decades and we are ready to assist you to take advantage of this terrific opportunity.
Other Resources:
Free Seminar Opportunity. If you would like to see us hosting a free seminar on how to apply for SBIR grants and have an opportunity to ask ask questions, please register and post a comment!
2 thoughts on “Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Grants”
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When are you planning to do the free seminar on SBIR grants? Will you include STTR also?
We will put the seminar on as soon as we have 5 or more people that want to participate. Of course the lesser known STTR grants and the particularities about it will be included as well!