Small business innovation program

Washington, DC Copyright by NOAA. Small Business Innovation Research Program. Competitive Opportunity for Small Business SBIR targets the entrepreneurial sector because that is where most innovation and innovators thrive. Learn About our Current Funding Opportunity.

Washington, DC T. Federal government websites always use a. Department of Agriculture USDA offers competitively awarded grants to qualified small businesses to support high quality research related to important scientific problems and opportunities in agriculture that could lead to significant public benefits. The program stimulates technological innovations in the private sector and strengthens the role of federal research and development in support of small businesses.

The SBIR program also fosters and encourages participation by women-owned and socially or economically disadvantaged small businesses. Firms for which the commercialization benchmark applies should consult SBIR.

More information on both of the above benchmarks can be found here. Please note that the proposal preparation instructions provided in this program solicitation may deviate from the PAPPG instructions. This solicitation contains the information needed to prepare a proposal and refers to specific sections of the PAPPG only when necessary.

The instructions in this solicitation take precedence over instructions in the PAPPG in the event of a conflict. Project Pitches may be submitted and will be reviewed on an ongoing basis even if there is no Phase I solicitation currently open at NSF.

Non-responsive proposals may be Returned without Review. A Phase I proposal Returned without Review may be submitted in a subsequent submission window if: 1 the Pitch is still valid i. Confidentiality and Proprietary Information.

Your proposal is confidential and will only be shared with a small number of reviewers and NSF staff as appropriate who have agreed to maintain the confidentiality of the proposal content. Your proposal to NSF does not constitute a public disclosure. If your company is chosen for a Phase I award, you will be prompted to write a project summary and description of intellectual merit and broader impact for the public. SBIR data, including proposals, are protected from disclosure by the participating agencies for not less than twenty years from the delivery of the last report or proposal associated with the given project.

To the extent permitted by law, the Government will not release properly identified technical and commercially sensitive data. If the proposal contains proprietary information, check the box at the bottom of the proposal Cover Sheet and identify proprietary technical data in the proposal by clearly marking the information and also providing a legend.

Typically, proprietary information is identified in the text either with an asterisk at the beginning and end of the proprietary paragraph, underlining the proprietary sections, or choosing a different font type. An entire proposal should not be marked proprietary.

Debriefing on Unsuccessful Proposals. When a proposal is declined, verbatim copies of reviews excluding the names, institutions, or other identifying information of the reviewers , summaries of review panel conclusions, if any, and a description of the process by which the proposal was reviewed Context Statement will be available electronically.

A proposer of a previously declined proposal must submit a new Project Pitch and, if invited, submit a new proposal after substantial revision, to be explicitly noted at submission. Proposals Returned without Review may be corrected for solicitation compliance issues and resubmitted with the same invited Pitch within one year of the initial Pitch invite. Proposal Format and Sample Limitations. Samples, videotapes, slides, appendices, or other ancillary items are not allowed within a proposal submission.

Websites containing demonstrations, etc. C of this solicitation for more details on accepted proposal fonts and format. Note that some of the registrations below in particular, SAM. You must register your company name, physical address and all other identifying information identically in each of these systems.

We recommend that you register your small business in the following order:. Failure to comply with the below guidelines means that a proposal may be Returned without Review.

It is suggested that you create a single PDF document for each section of the proposal, aggregate those PDF documents into a single file joining the various sections, then upload this single PDF to FastLane. The Project Summary is completed in FastLane by entering information into the three text boxes in the Project Summary module. Information MUST be entered into all three text boxes, or the proposal will not be accepted.

Provide a resume for the PI and Senior Personnel. Do not include personal information, such as home address or personal cell phone numbers, in Biographical Sketches.

List in reverse chronological order beginning with the current position. III Products : Includes patents, publications, etc. List up to 5 items related to the proposed work, and another 5 items that are significant but not related to the proposed work.

If the proposer elects to budget funds for one of the above purposes, the budget justification should include a brief description of the desired use of funds. The use of funds must be approved by the cognizant Program Director prior to award. All Phase I awardees are strongly encouraged to participate in this activity.

All costs related to the Boot Camp must be in line with approved salary rates and other relevant Federal guidelines. Proposers are also welcome to include suggestions of reviewers to include or not to include in the "List of Suggested Reviewers" module.

Other than these items, no other information or documents should be included in this section. Compliance with this requirement is critical to determining the relevant proposal processing guidelines. Failure to submit this information may delay processing. Other budgetary limitations apply. Proposers are required to prepare and submit all proposals for this program solicitation through use of the NSF FastLane system. Specific questions related to this program solicitation should be referred to the NSF program staff contact s listed in Section VIII of this funding opportunity.

All proposals are carefully reviewed by a scientist, engineer, or educator serving as an NSF Program Officer, and usually by three to ten other persons outside NSF either as ad hoc reviewers, panelists, or both, who are experts in the particular fields represented by the proposal.

These reviewers are selected by Program Officers charged with oversight of the review process. These suggestions may serve as one source in the reviewer selection process at the Program Officer's discretion. Submission of such names, however, is optional. Care is taken to ensure that reviewers have no conflicts of interest with the proposal. In addition, Program Officers may obtain comments from site visits before recommending final action on proposals.

Senior NSF staff further review recommendations for awards. These strategies are integrated in the program planning and implementation process, of which proposal review is one part. NSF's mission is particularly well-implemented through the integration of research and education and broadening participation in NSF programs, projects, and activities.

One of the strategic objectives in support of NSF's mission is to foster integration of research and education through the programs, projects, and activities it supports at academic and research institutions. These institutions must recruit, train, and prepare a diverse STEM workforce to advance the frontiers of science and participate in the U. NSF's contribution to the national innovation ecosystem is to provide cutting-edge research under the guidance of the Nation's most creative scientists and engineers.

NSF also supports development of a strong science, technology, engineering, and mathematics STEM workforce by investing in building the knowledge that informs improvements in STEM teaching and learning. NSF's mission calls for the broadening of opportunities and expanding participation of groups, institutions, and geographic regions that are underrepresented in STEM disciplines, which is essential to the health and vitality of science and engineering.

NSF is committed to this principle of diversity and deems it central to the programs, projects, and activities it considers and supports.

The National Science Foundation strives to invest in a robust and diverse portfolio of projects that creates new knowledge and enables breakthroughs in understanding across all areas of science and engineering research and education. To identify which projects to support, NSF relies on a merit review process that incorporates consideration of both the technical aspects of a proposed project and its potential to contribute more broadly to advancing NSF's mission "to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; to secure the national defense; and for other purposes.

These principles are to be given due diligence by PIs and organizations when preparing proposals and managing projects, by reviewers when reading and evaluating proposals, and by NSF program staff when determining whether or not to recommend proposals for funding and while overseeing awards.

Given that NSF is the primary federal agency charged with nurturing and supporting excellence in basic research and education, the following three principles apply:. With respect to the third principle, even if assessment of Broader Impacts outcomes for particular projects is done at an aggregated level, PIs are expected to be accountable for carrying out the activities described in the funded project.

Thus, individual projects should include clearly stated goals, specific descriptions of the activities that the PI intends to do, and a plan in place to document the outputs of those activities. These three merit review principles provide the basis for the merit review criteria, as well as a context within which the users of the criteria can better understand their intent.

In some instances, however, NSF will employ additional criteria as required to highlight the specific objectives of certain programs and activities. The two merit review criteria are listed below. Both criteria are to be given full consideration during the review and decision-making processes; each criterion is necessary but neither, by itself, is sufficient. Therefore, proposers must fully address both criteria.

When evaluating NSF proposals, reviewers will be asked to consider what the proposers want to do, why they want to do it, how they plan to do it, how they will know if they succeed, and what benefits could accrue if the project is successful. These issues apply both to the technical aspects of the proposal and the way in which the project may make broader contributions. To that end, reviewers will be asked to evaluate all proposals against two criteria:.