SBA hears suggestions for improving SBIR grant process

LEADERS OF small businesses eager to win Small Business Innovation Research grants asked a federal administrator at a roundtable Thursday to take steps to help them navigate the complex process.
LEADERS OF small businesses eager to win Small Business Innovation Research grants asked a federal administrator at a roundtable Thursday to take steps to help them navigate the complex process.

PROVIDENCE – Leaders of small businesses eager to win Small Business Innovation Research grants asked a federal administrator at a roundtable Thursday to take steps to help them navigate the complex process.
Javier Saade, the U.S. Small Business Administration’s associate administrator for the Office of Innovation and Investment, discussed his role in overseeing SBIR programming, then asked for feedback, and got a number of suggestions, which he said he’d bring back to colleagues at the national SBA office.
The roundtable was hosted at the R.I. Commerce Corporation and put together by that agency and the Rhode Island Science & Technology Advisory Council. About 20 business representatives, including several presidents and CEOs of small firms and startups, attended.
Raymond B. Sepe, president and CEO of Electro Standards Laboratories in Cranston, asked a question that didn’t have an easy answer, according to Saade.
Sepe’s firm has been awarded SBIR grants in the past, and while the application can lead to a grant, he said, there is no “in-between” step in which a reviewer who may not support awarding the grant can be approached about why that is the case. Subsequently, the application can be revised.
In cases in which several reviewers favor the application, but one may not, and the application is rejected, Sepe said, that additional step could make the difference between getting a grant or being rejected.
“If you want a better chance of succeeding, you need at least one step of feedback,” Sepe said.
He likened it to driving and looking both ways before moving forward. Without that interim step, he said, you’re likely to “drive off the road into a wall.”
Saade acknowledged that grant employees are incented to play by the rules more than take risks, but said he’d bring back the suggestion, which he considered a “humongous change” compared with how the process is handled now.
Clare King, president of Propel LLC of Pawtucket, asked if there were more resources to teach companies how to write grants. Her company focuses on the development, sales and marketing of textile-driven technologies and products, chiefly in the fire service and military markets.
After the meeting she explained that grant applications often have stringent and esoteric requirements, like not using the word “we,” and if you don’t write it “right,” you won’t get the grant, she said. She spent about $5,000 on classes to learn the right way to write a grant after failing to get one, and noted that there’s “no guidebook.”
Mark S. Hayward, SBA Rhode Island district director, agreed that businesses could use more help writing the grants.
Saade said he has hired a new staff member, John Williams, who is “thinking about these things.”
William H. Weedon, president and CEO of Applied Radar Inc. in North Kingstown, wanted to know when the federal government will bring budgets for grants “back to where they were.”
“You cannot sustain a business in SBIR awards,” Weedon said. “You need to have four of five ‘phase 2’ [grants] coming in a year. The value just is not there.”
Saade deferred to Karen Bradbury, assistant projects director for U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. Bradbury said she’d bring that message to Whitehouse.
Saade also noted that www.sba.gov is being revamped to provide information in one place, so that “everything is two clicks – like Amazon[.com]. Centralization of information is one of the things we should be doing better,” he said.

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