SBIR and the Phase III Challenge of Commercialization Report of a Symposium (2007) / Chapter Skim
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Panel III: Challenges of Phase III: SBIR Award Winners
Panel III: Challenges of Phase III: SBIR Award Winners
Pages 102-123
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From page 102... ...
About a third of the government sales were R&D transition dollars to take SBIR programs to commercialization. (See Figure 18.)
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From page 103... ...
In total, the company had won almost $23 million in SBIR awards, averaging about one-and-a-half or two Phase II awards per year. They had won 75 Phase I awards and 25 Phase II awards altogether, most of them within the last two years.
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From page 104... ...
It involved a set of ceramic composite technologies that originated from a Navy SBIR program for computer-automated control. The topic tied in also with a NASA program and a DARPA program, allowing ACR to develop a new technique of precision machining that revolutionized the manufacture of computer hard-drive disks.
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From page 105... ...
Program Managers in the federal acquisition community do not intention ally shun the small business community, but they have no strong incentive to embrace a new technology or process from a small business when the risk is likely to be higher. In closing, he said that the SBIR program works very well.
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From page 106... ...
Another Defense Authorization Act recommendation was to establish good linkages between SBIR solicitation topics and acquisitions people. This, he said, was also done, and today some 60 percent of SBIR programs are directly related to acquisition programs.
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From page 107... ...
Gansler, but it was removed before finalization. He said that other Congressional reports over the years had also contained "good ideas" that were never implemented, most likely because they would mean changes to the way "business had always been done." He blamed not the large DoD prime contractors, but the DoD itself, which had grown comfortable in dealing primarily with big prime contractors and large, horizontally integrated companies to address acquisition needs.
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From page 108... ...
If these program managers would place the SBIR in their budgets and in their planning, he suggested, they could unleash "the innovative might of small business in America" and the country would reap a bounty of "better products faster and cheaper." He closed by quoting the 1982 law authorizing the SBIR program. Its purpose was "to ensure that federal R&D procuring officers and program managers make use of the wealth of resources available from small businesses in addressing the mission and research needs of their agencies." The SBIR program was not a welfare program for small businesses, he concluded, but a way to get the DoD what it needs "faster, better, and cheaper."
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From page 109... ...
In order to deal with both technology push and market pull, Orbitec had created a separate entity called Planet LLC, which is a technology incubator. Product development and licenses flow from Orbitec to Planet, while royalties, R&D for product upgrades, new market-pull ideas, SBIR marketing plans, licensing agreements, and commitments for SBIR flow from Planet to Orbitec.
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From page 110... ...
He said this was a serious issue for the SBIR program, with a long history. Orbitec's $57 million contract for the Plant Research Unit -- its largest NASA contract to date -- was reduced by more than 80 percent after the first year.
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From page 111... ...
He attributed this to his company's lack of sufficient clout within NASA to maintain budget levels at a time when NASA was changing its priorities, notably including a shift in emphasis away from the International Space Station and toward the moon and Mars. The impact of Phase III contract reductions was especially severe because the contracts were by then the growth engine of the company.
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From page 112... ...
And third, maintain advocacy activities throughout the SBIR work to seek allies among technical monitors, ultimate users, contract managers, SBIR management, and congressional representatives. Robert M
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From page 113... ...
Certain individuals, he said, were at that time giving contracts to various prime contractors, and "we were victim." But the company built the vehicle, and sold one to NAV-Air, and the technology was used on an unmanned boat that the Navy was using on mission modules for a combat ship. As a result of this experience, Mr.
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From page 114... ...
3. Lastly, SBIR program offices in DoD should have funds to support (under contract)
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From page 115... ...
Other systems where the company develops technology are the Joint Strike Fighter (F-35) , CH-47D Chinook Helicopter, H-60 helicopter, USS Briscoe with
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From page 116... ...
The first, which would be inexpensive, would be to educate the large prime contractors about the SBIR pro
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From page 117... ...
This would be, he said, a "real Phase III contract." Finally, he suggested additional funding for TAP-like programs, with more focus on networking and brokering deals between the small businesses and the large prime contractors. He noted that part of the Navy program includes a small amount of market research to identify potential customers, and urged more such research.
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From page 118... ...
The good news, he said, is that once a materials system is accepted, it is likely to be used for many years, creating a strong incentive to push for technology insertion. A Strengthening Alliance with Prime Contractors He said that the SBIR program had been fundamental to his company's involvement in both adding new technology to the DoD and strengthening its alliance with prime contractors.
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From page 119... ...
The largest challenge by far, he said, was convincing a project manager or Program Executive Officer to take the risk of incorporating a new technology from a small business. For the prime contractors, he said, risk drives everything, and he could easily put himself in the place of a project manager having to answer to upper man agement that a risky critical element in the design of a multi-billion-dollar program had been awarded to a small firm that might not be up to the task.
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From page 120... ...
Adapting the SBIR Program to Changes in Business He also recalled that in putting together the SBIR program and the amendments, "what we were doing was trying to think SBIR as a system -- how you get from idea to prototype to actual commercialization." He confessed that the model used was somewhat "clumsy" and linear, pretending to move through prescribed "phases." Even so, he said, in the 20 years since the program started, many program managers have been creative in using and adapting the program, to the
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From page 121... ...
has had the authority since 1989 to enter into contractual arrangements called "Other Transactions" with its private sector R&D partners. Other Transaction agreements are characterized by enhanced flexibility and reduced administrative burden when compared with the typical government procurement contract.
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From page 122... ...
As a result, a number of the more successful SBIR Phase III funds do not come from the DoD program managers' initiative but from Congressional action. After some discussion of the pros and cons of this practice, he suggested that it would be preferable for the agencies, rather than Congress, to pick the best SBIR II outcomes and put them into the budget process with Phase III funding.
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From page 123... ...
Dr. Gansler added that a goal of the SBIR program is to sell a technology to DoD or NSF, and also to sell it in the commercial world.
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