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The Volpe Center manages the Department of Transportation's SBIR program. Joe Henebury, DOT's SBIR Program Director, was a key person in organizing and participating in the SWIFT tour. Tour promotes effort to help small businessAlbany--Capital Region companies offered array of funding to launch new projectsBy Jean DerGurahian A federal road tour stops in town today, hoping to enlighten small businesses about a grant program and at the same time to boost submissions from companies outside major metropolitan areas. The SWIFT (SBIR--Where Innovation Focuses Technology) tour, a 10-day pass through New York and New England, gives executives direct access to eight program managers of the $1.2 billion U.S. Small Business Innovation Research program, which offers money for private research. Those managers want to stimulate interest in the program in regions where grant applications have lagged behind markets such as Boston and New York City. Small businesses in California and Massachusetts have received more SBIR grants each year since the program started in 1983, said Jeff Bond, SBIR program manager for the U.S. Defense Department's Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. "Where we're going is the typically low-award areas," Bond said. This is the second year SWIFT has been on the road. Last year, the managers toured the Midwest. BUSINESS AIDSTouted as one of the more successful federal funding programs, Small Business Innovation Research helps companies jump the hurdles of getting off the ground. U.S. agencies involved:
Funding levels:
Source: Department of Defense The tour arrives in the Capitol Region--after stops in western Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut--with a half-day event at the University of Albany's Center for Environmental Sciences and Technology Management on Fuller Road in Albany. A few area companies have received SBIR grants, typically allocated in two states. But for the most part, the region hasn't been a big winner, said James Woo, president of InterScience Inc., a North Greenbush research company that has won a number of SBIR grants, but has fallen off its awards in the last year. Woo also co-founded the Small Business Technology Coalition, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based national trade group to increase awareness of the SBIR program. Awarded through U.S. agencies, SBIR grants are given in two phases; Phase I, which offers up to $100,000 for feasibility studies of an idea or technology; and Phase II, which offers up to $750,000 to expand first-phase results, which should lead to a prototype of the technology. In 1999, 17 companies statewide received Phase I grants averaging $500,000 from the Defense Department, perhaps one of the most active agencies in funding projects. The department, which is sponsoring the SWIFT tour, awards more that $550 million annually. The National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation are a few of the other agencies heavily invested in innovative technology. David Gibson, president and chief executive officer of X-Ray Optical Systems Inc., said two SBIR grants through the Department of Energy launched is company--a developer of X-rays for measuring devices--10 years ago. The firm, founded in UAlbany's incubator and now with 30 employees in Corporate Circle in Albany, has since received more Phase I and Phase II grants. Few local companies know about the program or understand how it might help them, he said. SBIR is designed to make the development process more manageable, but most executives don't think about finding external funding sources for their technology. But the program's success comes from the Phase II funding. Most small businesses can do a lot with $750,000, Gibson said. "That's enough money to do some serious work," he added. Applied BioPhysics Inc., a start-up located in Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's incubator in Troy, also used an SBIR grant to kick off. The company manufactures an electrical method to study human cell activities when grown in tissue cultures. Formed in 1991 by two former managers at the General Electric Co., Corporate Research & Development Center in Niskayuna, Applied BioPhysics has received three Phase I and Phase II grants to support development, said Charles Keese, vice president. Without the grants, Applied BioPhysics wouldn't have left the ground he said. Now the company can concentrate on marketing efforts to expand sales, Keese said. Reprinted with permission from the Times Union in Albany, New York. |
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