SBA Seeks Comments on SBIR Directive

In today's edition of the Federal Register, the Small Business Administration (SBA) has issued the draft revised policy directive for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program. The public is invited to comment on the proposed directive, which provides guidance to the ten federal agencies participating in the program. SBIR annually awards more than $1 billion to small businesses across the country for research and development. Comments must be received by the SBA on or before June 18, 2001.



Legislation passed by Congress in December to reauthorize the SBIR program (Public Law 106-554) required SBA to prepare the first changes to the policy directive since 1993. While the SBIR Reauthorization Act did not include many substantive changes to the federal program, a quick review of the new policy directive reveals several proposed changes of potential interest to the tech-based economic development community.



In general, the new directive would provide the federal agencies greater latitude in meeting the legislated requirements of the SBIR program. For example, while the public law sets specific maximum award size and project duration for Phase I and Phase II awards, the proposed policy directive allows any agency to set its own limits provided the new limits are justified in the agency's annual report to the SBA, which would be submitted after the awards had been made.



The draft directive also expands the flexibility provided to the agencies for administering their SBIR and STTR programs (Small Business Technology Transfer Program) to the extent that Phase I projects of one program could receive Phase II funding from the other.



The current draft also requires the agencies to incorporate use of the Internet to facilitate information dissemination for proposal development. Additionally, the Directive outlines the elements of the commercialization plan that is required of all phase II SBIR proposals. Provisions for the newly mandated public and private databases on awards are included as well.



Apparently lacking in the revised policy directive is any discussion of the requirement in the SBIR Reauthorization Act of 2000 for federal agencies to coordinate and link their SBIR programs to their programmatic efforts to increase research activity within states that traditionally do not capture much federal R&D funding. (e.g., Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), Institutional Development Award Program, or National Research Initiative Competitive Grants Program.)



The complete Federal Register text of the SBA's proposed policy directive can be found on the accompanying webpage. 

All comments concerning the proposed revision should be addressed to Maurice Swinton, Assistant Administrator for Technology, Office of Technology, Office of Policy, Planning, and Liaison, Office of Government Contracting/Business Development, U.S. Small Business Administration, 409 3rd Street, SW, Washington, DC 20416 or via email to technology@sba.gov

Editor's Note: SSTI will include its own and possibly other interpretations of the proposed policy directive in an upcoming issue of the SSTI Weely Digest.



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