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cventuaDy to commercial applications. The program thus fiu', however, has been handicapped by lack 

 of sufficient fiinds to fully justify the proposal efforts wfaicfa smaD businesses have put forth to capture 

 these &uids Although the progrun b expanding on a year to year basis, it still represents less funding 

 than is warranted; it may be taking more resources out of snuD business than it puts in. 



An improvement to SBIR wodd be a reassessment of and reconciliation between the high degree of 

 innovation sought in proposals and rewarded with funding (j>aiticularly at some agencies) and the 

 simultaneous requirement for rapid commercialization. Although many of the very iimovative 

 concepts will eventually result in or contribute to importam commercial products, the difBcukies 

 involved in bringing these technologies to market make these programs almost "unsuccessful" by 

 definition in the eyes of SBIR because of demaiub for very near term commercializatioa 



The SBIR program has always been somewhat fragmented by different agency approaches to, fbr 

 example, proposal review, contract monitoring, and continuity between Phase I and Phase n The 

 SBIR program could benefit from standard procedures used by all agencies which incorporate the 

 best aspects of current approaches. NIH, for example, provides the roost comprehensive reviews of 

 proposals, and allows for resubmission of proposals with revisions reflecting the previous review. 

 This process is very constructive for the proposing firm and encourages very hi^ quality proposals. 

 Most other agencies, on the other hand, do not allow and/or are generally unreceptive to, 

 resubmissions of any Phase D proposals without going back through the Phase I activity. Tmtely 

 reviews, particularly of Phase II proposals, are also of benefit to the program since they allow for 

 better performance by the proposing firm, both for technical continuation of Phase I work into 

 Phase n, and for financial planning. Sense agencies, for example, can go as long as two years before 

 they award a Phase 11 fix>m a Phase I efibrt. The Department of Energy's option for early submission 

 of Phase II proposals to allow near continuous fimding is useful for firms able to get results early on 

 in the Phase I program. Another issue is that government program managers often attempt to spread 

 the funding around such that it only comes to the small business in dribs and drabs which makes it 

 very difficult for the firm to get any product momentum or to plan for availability of personnci 

 Finally, I recommend consideration of a Phase HI SBIR program, which would address such this?g; 

 as marketing the product and would be cost-shared fifty percent by small business, to bring raore 

 SBIR concepts to commercialization. 



