An Assessment of the SBIR Program at the Department of Defense (2009) / Chapter Skim
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Pages 12-22
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of the National Academies conduct a "comprehensive study of how the SBIR program has stimulated technological innovation and used small businesses to meet Federal research and development needs," and make recommendations on improvements to the program.2 Mandated as a part of SBIR's renewal in December 2000, the NRC study has assessed the SBIR program as administered at the five federal agencies that together make up 96 percent of SBIR program expenditures. The agencies are, in decreasing order of program size: the Department of Defense (DOD)
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Since the SBIR program's inception at DoD, all SBIR awards have been contracts awarded on a competitive basis. As conceived in the 1982 Act, SBIR's grant-making process is structured in three phases: Phase I grants essentially fund feasibility studies in which award winners undertake a limited amount of research aimed at establishing an idea's scientific and commercial promise.
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at $525 million. The DoD SBIR program, is made up of 10 participating components: (see Figure 1)
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It called for a two-phase assessment by the National Research Council of the broader impacts of the program.11 The goals of the SBIR program, as set out in the 1982 legislation, are: "(1) to stimulate technological innovation; (2)
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As the October 2002 conference made clear, the administrative flexibility found in the SBIR program makes it difficult to make cross-agency assessments. Although each agency's SBIR program shares the common three-phase structure, the SBIR concept is interpreted uniquely at each agency.
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This non-linearity, illustrated in Figure 1-2, underscores the challenge of assessing the impact of the SBIR program's individual awards. Inputs do not match up with outputs according to a simple function.15 FIGURE 1-2 A Feedback Model of Innovation.
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The task of measuring outcomes is also made harder because companies that have garnered SBIR awards can also merge, fail, or change their name before a product reaches the market. In addition, principal investigators or other key individuals can change firms, carrying their knowledge of an SBIR project with them.
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" This raises the issue concerning the standard by which SBIR programs should be evaluated. An assessment of SBIR must take into account the expected distribution of successes and failures in early-stage finance.
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1.6. SBIR ASSESSMENT RESULTS Drawing on interviews, multiple survey instruments and case studies, and overcoming many of the research challenges identified above, the NRC Committee has developed a number of findings and practical recommendations for improving the effectiveness of the SBIR program at the Department of Defense.
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Chapter 6 describes the diversity of management structures as well as current practices and recent reforms found among the different services and agencies that fund SBIR programs at DoD. Together, this report provides the most detailed and comprehensive picture to date of the SBIR program at the Department of Defense.
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