The Department of Energy (DOE) has announced a new SBIR solicitation, with applications due in mid-September. Until the Funding Opportunity Announcement is officially posted in early August, potential applicants may contact the Technical Topics Managers to discuss the topics.
In an effort to improve commercialization outcomes of the funded projects, the DOE has made several changes to the SBIR/STTR program, which includes adjusting the solicitation release policy, commercialization emphasis and award dollars. Effective with this solicitation, the DOE will now release two solicitations each year. The first will contain topics from the Office of Science, and the second will feature topics from the remaining DOE program offices. Topics will be posted in advance of the issuance of the full solicitation and letters of intent will be required in advance of full proposals, so applicants must plan ahead.
The DOE is also increasing the emphasis on commercialization plans in both Phase I and Phase II. Phase I proposals lacking commercialization plans will be declined without technical proposal review. Phase II commercialization applications will be rated independently of technical merit, and those that receive poor scores on their commercialization plans will not be funded, even if they receive high technical scores. And finally, STTR award amounts will increase to $150,000 for Phase I and to $1 million for Phase II, consistent with maximum SBIR awards. These changes are all detailed in a letter from Manny Oliver, Director of the SBIR/STTR Programs Office within the Department of Energy.
July 29 webinar to discuss changes
The Center for Innovative Technology’s Federal Funding Assistance Program is hosting a July 29th seminar on these changes from 1 to 2:30 p.m. EDT. The featured speaker is Carl Hebron, the DOE’s SBIR/STTR Program Coordinator. The webinar is free, but attendance is limited. You can sign up here.
For more information, review our online resources or join us at an SBIR Circle, held every Thursday at 10:30 a.m. in ATDC room 207 at Technology Square, 75 Fifth St NW.
NASA, one of the largest players in the SBIR/STTR funding pool, has opened the 2011 SBIR/STTR solicitation for Phase I projects. Proposals are due September 8. The maximum value of Phase I awards has been increased to $125,000. According to NASA, the acceptance rate for both SBIR and STTR proposals is 8:1, with 45 percent of those selected for Phase I also being selected for follow-on Phase II awards. Topics include specific areas within aeronautics research, exploration systems, space operations and planet & space science. The topic list is included in the solicitation. Remember to read the solicitation carefully and make sure you meet all the checklist requirements. For more information, review our online resources or join us at an SBIR Circle, held every Thursday at 10:30 a.m. in ATDC room 207 at Technology Square, 75 Fifth St NW.
The US Department of Defense has pre-released an SBIR Solicitation. Proposals are accepted starting December 13th and ending January 12th, 2010. Topics in this solicitation are numerous and include solicitations from the Army, Navy, CBD, DARPA, DTRA, OSD-DHP, and SOCOM.
Between November 10 and December 12, 2010, Topic Authors are available to answer technical questions about the topics. Topic Author’s names, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses are listed within each solicitation topic document. Proposals must follow DoD general instructions as well as the requirements of the specific DoD division. Click here to access the DoD SBIR post for full solicitation details.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate has released an SBIR Solicitation. Responses are accepted starting Novemeber 18th and ending January 6th, 2010. Topics in this solicitation are:
- Small Vessel Identification and Tracking Technologies
- Preparation of Environmental Samples for Biological Detection
- Public Safety Broadband Mobile Application for Mission Critical Voice
- Monolithic, Electronically and Widely Tunable Semiconductor-Based Infrared Laser Sources
- Mitigation of Contact Lens, Eye Surgery, Pupil Dilation, and Other Challenges on Iris Recognition
- Improved Firefighter Face Piece Lenses for Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus
Click here to read the full solicitation for further details.
The National Institutes of Standards and Technology has issued it’s 2011 SBIR solicitation. Proposals are being accepted as of November 4th and will be due no later than January 28th, 2011. Budgets may not exceed $90,000 for Phase I. Click here to see the full details and instructions in the solicitation.
The topics for this solicitation are
- Ontologies for Modeling Enterprise Level Security Metrics
- Instrument for Characterization of Environmental Soot Aggregates
- Instrument for Detection of Inhaler Dose Concentration
- mm-Wave Phase Noise Measurement System Using Photonic Delay-Line
- High-accuracy relative angle monitoring apparatus
- Real-time intensity monitoring of laboratory X-ray sources
- Electrical Connectors for Millimeter-Wave Instrumentation
- Standard OWL Reasoning Support for Physical Quantities and Units
- Development of an SCAP Content Creation Tool
- Non-contact microwave measurement of electrical properties of nanofiber materials
- An Automated Test-bed for Assessing System-of-System (SoS) Assurance
- Cloud Computing Security Discriminators
- Monitoring for Complex Information Systems
- Environmental Chambers for an Integrating Sphere-based Weathering Device
- Calibration of Critical Dimension Scanning Electron Microscopes
- RFID-Integrated Sensor Networks
- Sustainable Manufacturing Maturity Model Development
- Dynamic Six Degree of Freedom (6DOF) Vision System
- Development of anion exchange resins for chirality-based separation of single walled carbon nanotubes
- 3D Tip Characterization and Surface Reconstruction voiding
- Ultrafast Optical Detector at 1550 nm
- Orientation-Patterned Gallium Arsenide
- Decision support tools for Sustainable Manufacturing
- A Common Platform for Microrobotics Research
- Semi-Autonomous, Articulated Forklift (SAAF) in Close Proximity to Workers
- Parallel Signal-Processing System for High-Resolution Tomography
- High-Efficiency Visible Light Photon Counters
- High-Resolution Optical Pulse Shaper
- Disassembly Model and Analysis Tools for End-of-service Life Product Treatment
- Sustainability Performance Analysis Tools for Evaluating Manufacturing Processes
- Production of ISMRM/NIST MRI Calibration Phantoms voiding
- Signal Processing Methods for High-Dimensional Microsensor Data Streams
- Development of a MEMS Oscillatory Parallel-Plate Rheometer
- Micro-cruciform tensile stage for XRD and SEM/EBSD
The National Science Foundation has issued it’s 2011 STTR solicitation. Proposals will begin being accepted on October 17th and will be due no later than November 17th. Budgets may not exceed $150,000.
The STTR (Small Business Technology Transfer) will require a partnership between a small business and a non-profit research institute (usually a university). The researchers at the research institute must play a significant intellectual role in the STTR project, but the Principal Investigator (PI) must be primarily employed with the small business and the small business must still conduct at least 40% of the technical effort.
The only topic for this solicitation is “Digital Gaming for Education” (DGE). Within that main topic, there are 4 subtopics. Proposals that do not fit within one of these 4 subtopics will NOT be accepted:
Digital Gaming in Education for Learning:
A. Informal (I)
B. Formal (F)
Digital Gaming in Education for Culture and Society:
C. Cross Cultural Dialogue and Discoveries (CCDD)
D. Platforms for Healthy Living (PHL)
Details and instructions are found in the solicitation.
The Department of Defense has pre-issued two solicitations simultaneously: an SBIR (SBIR 2010.3) and an STTR (STTR 2010.B). There are separate topics for each solicitation, so you cannot submit an SBIR proposal for an STTR topic and vice versa. Utilize the DOD Topic Search Engine to find topics that match your company’s capabilities.
Read the solicitations in detail as SBIR and STTR are slightly different. Also, read the separate Component-specific (Army, AF, DARPA, MDA, etc.) instructions as proposal requirements vary among the Components.
The DOD will begin accepting proposals on August 17th and all proposals must be submitted before 6:00 AM on September 15th. You are urged to contact the topic Technical Point of Contact (TPOC) to ask additional technical questions not found in the topic itself. You may NOT make direct contact with the TPOC after August 16th–don’t wait until the last minute to ask questions and expect them to respond to you ASAP, it might take some time for them to get back with you.
Your company will need a Tax ID #, DUNs #, and CAGE code before you register to submit your proposal. If you do not have these numbers, you need to start soon as obtaining these numbers might take some time. See the document “Registration Requirements” for more information.
Do you have a technology that might be useful in the Gulf Oil Crisis? The National Science Foundation is exploring all options. Even if the leak is capped today, there will be a problem in the Gulf and surrounding areas for months and even years. Solutions related to all facets of impact will be needed.
NSF issued a RAPID (Grants for Rapid Response Research) for the Gulf Crisis at the end of May. RAPIDs are used to enable research on unanticipated events such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, or any event where timely presence is required to enable the research.
NSF is seeking brief proposals (2-5 pages) before September 30th. Research awards will be made up to $200Kif justified. Unlike the standard NSF review process, these proposals will only go through an internal review before the awards are made, reducing the timeline.
PI(s) must contact the NSF program officer(s) whose expertise is most germane to the proposal topic before submitting a RAPID proposal. This will facilitate determining whether the proposed work is appropriate for RAPID funding.
For more details see: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/policydocs/pappguide/nsf10_1/gpg_2.jsp#IID1.
All questions regarding this RAPID, should be directed to Dr. Don Senich (dsenich@nsf.gov) or Mr. Kevin Simmons (kesimmons@nsf.gov).
The USDA has released it’s FY 2011 SBIR solicitation. Proposals will be due no later than September 2nd and must include a budget of no more than $100,000 for an 8-month period.
The USDA National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA) has identified five primary “societal challenge areas”. Proposals that fit in one of the topics below AND address these challenge areas are highly encouraged:
1. Global Food Security and Hunger
2. Climate Change
3. Sustainable Bioenergy
4. Childhood Obesity
5. Food Safety
Proposals are also encouraged in these government-wide initiatives:
1. Agriculturally-related Manufacturing Technology
2. Energy Efficiency and Alternative and Renewable Energy
The Topics for this solicitiation are:
8.1-Forests and Related Resources;
8.2-Plant Production and Protection – Biology;
8.3-Animal Production and Protection;
8.4-Air, Soil and Water Resources;
8.5-Food Science and Nutrition;
8.6-Rural and Community Development;
8.7-Aquaculture;
8.8- Biofuels and Biobased Products;
8.12-Small and Mid Size Farms;
8.13-Plant Production and Protection – Engineering
Please be sure to read the solicitation for proposal preparation instructions and topic descriptions.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate has an open SBIR Solicitation. Proposals are due on June 24th and could result in Phase I Awards up to $100,000. Companies may contact the DHS with technical questions before June 10th. Topics in this solicitation are:
- Detector for Smuggled Currency
- Next Generation Vacuum Systems for Hand-held Mass Spectrometers
- Large-Scale Network Survivability, Rapid Recovery, and Reconstitution
- Non-Detonable, Non-Hazardous, Low-Cost, Hexamethylene Triperoxide Diamine (HMTD) Training Aids for Canines
- Automated Tool for Assessing Usability
- Helmet with Embedded Active Display for Emergency Responders (HEADER)
- Accelerating the Deployment of DHS Center of Excellence Research through Advanced Business Practices
- Handheld Multisensor Wand for the Detection of Threat or Illicit Objects on Persons
- Personal Situational Awareness App
Read the solicitation for further details.
NOTE: DHS encourages submission of topics for future solicitations. Check their site out for more details.