FINISHED FILE

NATIONAL DISABILITY INSTITUTE
ALEXIS JONES
MARCH 12, 2025
SBIR/STTR MASTERCLASS
12:30 P.M. CT

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[ Recording in progress ]
>> CAROLINE BOLAS: Welcome, everyone, to our SBIR/STTR Masterclass webinar.  We'll give you a moment to get your audio set up.  And then we'll begin very shortly.  Next slide.
Before we introduce our speaker, we're just going to do some housekeeping.  Zoom settings.  The audio for today's meeting can be accessed using computer audio.  Or by calling in by phone.
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If your question is not answered during the webinar, you are listening by phone, or you are unable to use the chat box, please email info@disabilitysmallbusiness.org.  And please note, this webinar is being recorded.  And all the materials will be available at disabilitysmallbusiness.org on our past events page within one to two weeks.  Next slide.
So, welcome again to our SBIR/STTR Masterclass.  Before I have the pleasure of introducing our wonderful presenter, we do request you take a short pretest.  This is to allow us to sort of see where your knowledge is at the beginning of the program.  We're then going to have the same questions at the end.  Just to see whether or not we've met our learning objectives.  And if there are other things we need to cover in the future.
Please note, this is no judgment.  This is not saying you should know something.  We want your honest responses.  You should, in a moment, see your pretest.  We're just going to give you a few minutes to answer the five questions.
For those just joining us, you should see a poll on your screens that we're asking everyone to complete.  It seems I'm having some Zoom issues.  I've been thrown out twice.  I apologize for that. 
With that out of the way, it gives me great pleasure to introduce Kimberly or Kim Mozingo, the Vice President for Federal programs at TEDCO.  She's a real expert when it comes to the federal grants.  So we're delighted to have her today.  Before I hand it over to Kim, though.  Just to say the contents of this webinar was developed under a grant number H421F240198 from the Department of Education.
However, those contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the Department of Education.  And you should not assume endorsement by the federal government.  With that out of the way, I'll hand it over to Kim.  It's going to be a great presentation, I know.
>> KIMBERLY MOZINGO: Yes, I hope so.  It's nice to meet everyone.  This is the SBIR/STTR masterclass.  This slide has today's date on it.
Before we get into that, I wanted to tell you where I sit in TEDCO.  TEDCO has a mission to develop economic empowerment.  We do that by identifying, investing in, and helping to grow technology companies and life science companies in Maryland.
These are some of the programs that we have for TEDCO.  We have a program called FLLIP, federal lanes leveraging innovation to products.  BRIDGE.  I cannot tell you what it means at the moment.  This is a program that helps companies with financial backing.
DefTech is a program that connects companies to federal labs.  Prelude Pitch is a program.  Where you can apply and pitch your business.  During this program, you pitch for ten minutes.  You have ten minutes of questions from people we've asked to assemble.  And then you get ten minutes of feedback from them.
Our marketing toolkit is another program that we offer.  We have the proposal lab.  Which is running right now.  This is an NSF, SBIR/STTR proposal lab.  We have network advisers.  They are people we use to work with you.
We have business roundtables.  Market search databases.  Which is something that you can apply for, through TEDCO.  If you're a TEDCO company, you can use that.
Start‑up orientation forum.  Which helps companies get on the right path.  The Maryland entrepreneur hub is something that we put together with the Maryland Department of Commerce.  The rural and urban business innovation initiatives.
Because we do cover the entire state of Maryland, we like to have people in certain places.  We have a lot of rural communities in the state.  So we have someone in each of our rural communities.  And our urban program is in Prince George's County and in Baltimore state.
We do offer investments to companies.  Which I know everyone likes to know about.  This is to foster the growth and scaling of strong companies in Maryland.  And provide economic and financial returns to the state.
Our social impact funds invest in precede technology‑based businesses owned and managed by economically disadvantaged entrepreneurs.  Our concept capital fund is new.  This fund offers between $25,000 and $50,000.  Our precede fund, we have two of those.  They offer between $100,000 to $200,000.
And these are convertible notes.  Our seed fund offers four different funds.  This is between $100,000 and $500,000 in initial investment capital.  And our early‑stage venture capital is up to $1.5 million.
I will also mention that every ‑‑ the last Wednesday of the month, we have an investment open forum.  So, if you want more information about this, I suggest you attend our investment open forum.  We have three tech transfer programs.  We have something called the Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund.  The empty Innovation Initiative Fund.  And federal Technology Transfer.
I work in Federal Technology Transfer.  This is moving innovations from the research lab to the commercial sector.  To create new ventures.  And to make new products and cures available to the public.
In federal programs, our goal is to help Maryland businesses grow.  By helping them to make use of the public investment in science, technology, and innovation available through our federal labs.  And if you don't know, we have twice as many federal labs as any other state.  We've helped to bring in, so far, actually, $28.8 million with our SBIR/STTR awards.
We have 90 federal labs in the state.  And we work, so far, with about 187 companies.  So, on to the purpose of our program.  America's seed fund, Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer.
So a good way to start this is by talking about an organization that has brought in funding from HHS.  SBIR funding provided by HHS, which is Health and Human Services, helped the company advance genetic science.
Over five years, 23andMe received NIH SBIR funding to help improve the effectiveness of its data collection and analytics.  And to enhance racial diversity in genetics research.  Today, the company's research platform is the largest consented recontactable database for genetic research.
The purpose of SBIR and STTR is to meet federal research and development needs.  To increase private sector commercialization of innovation derived from federal R & D funding.  To stimulate technological innovation.
To foster and encourage participation in innovation and entrepreneurship.  By women and socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.  To foster technology transfer through cooperative R & D.  Between small businesses and research institutions.  That's through the STTR program.
SBIR and STTR.  $4.3 billion in competitive grant and contract awards have been funded since FY 22.  In FY 22, funding resulted in 6,000 awards to 3700 awardees.  The government does not take equity in your company when they invest in you.
IP ownership is retained by your small business.  Over $50 billion has gone to American small businesses since 1982.  And SBIR played a catalytic role in many American innovation giants.  Including Qualcomm, iRobot, Illumina, Symantec, and is responsible for the Phillips Sonicare toothbrush, which I love.  It's my favorite toothbrush.
There are 11 agencies that offer SBIR and STTR programming.  The U.S. Department of Agricultural.  The Department of Defense.  The Department of Energy, the Department of Health and Human Services.  The National Aeronautics and Space administration and the National Science Foundation.  All offer both SBIR and STTR programs. 
The Department of Commerce.  The Department of Education.  The Department of Homeland Security.  The Department of Transportation.  And the Environmental Protection Agency also offer SBIR programs.  That's because they don't have the budget that the other six programs do.
If you were to build an org chart that looked at who belongs to which agency, this is what that org chart would look like.  You can see the DoD has many different agencies they support.  HHS has four different agencies.  Within that, NIH has 29 different centers.  And the Department of Commerce has two agencies.
This slide shows the agency release timelines.  This is important.  Because you'll want to know when an agency is going to release their proposal.  So that you can speak to their program managers.
This is very complicated, of course.  But if you look at, for example, the Department of Energy.  Oops, sorry.  They have something called their topic release.
When their topic release is open, you can call the agency.  And talk to their program managers.  You can do that throughout the whole time that they're accepting proposals.  The Department of Defense has three different actual time periods when you can talk to their program managers.
And NSF is open all year.  And the HHS omnibus is also open all year long.  That means NSF has close dates.  They close on the 2nd of July.  I think they close on the 15th of March.  In a couple of days.
They close the 2nd of July and around the 15th of November.  You can respond to them any time during the year.  Even though they close the 2nd of July, they're open on the 3rd.  So you can send in a new portfolio or new proposal on the 3rd of July.
And there are a few interesting differences between contracts and grants.  The Department of Defense, for example, is very much agency initiated.  So, in general, they offer their SBIRs and STTRs as highly focused topics.  They'll tell you this specifically is what they want a solution for.
That means you write your proposal.  So that it meets the needs of their agency.  Many agencies are like that.  The NSF is a granting agency.  But let me go back to contracts for a minute.
They're highly focused.  This is a procurement.  So, they are expecting you to provide them with exactly what you want to do.  There is fiscal reporting with this.  So, you have to report on everything that you're working on.
You invoice on your progress.  Instead of just invoicing once at the beginning and once at the end.  It is a binding agreement.  So, what you say you're going to do in your proposal, you need to actually do.
And, again, the PI‑initiated proposals are a little bit different.  They are generally grants.  They can be very less focused.  Instead of an agency telling you, this specifically is what we want.  They're open.
So, you could submit a wide variety of topics to them.  They are assistance.  They are more flexible.  They do allow upfront payment.
For example, NSF offers grants.  And they have a $305,000, I think, right now is what they're offering for their SBIR.  You can invoice them for 75% of that $305,000 right out of the gate.  As soon as you get your award, you can send them an invoice for 75% of that.
It is usually a best effort in research that they're looking for.  And this is NSF, Department of Energy, USDA, NIST and NOAA.  HHS do both contracts and grants.  But you get a lot of grants out of HHS.
So the SBIR program is three phases.  I say SBIR, I also mean STTR as well.  Just to make it easier, I'm going to say SBIR.  So this is three phases.
It's very difficult to write an SBIR proposal and have it be accepted.  There's a 15% award rate.  Because they receive hundreds of applications.  If you get a phase I award, you can go on to request a phase II award.
Usually, you're invited to apply for a phase II.  And there's about a 40 to 50% award rate for phase II.  Phase III is where you achieve commercialization.  And you are not funded by the SBIR program.  So these dollars you might get for a phase III award don't come from the SBIR program.
So phase I is the concept phase.  It's $50,000 to $305,000.  It usually lasts for six to 12 months.  It supports exploration of the technical merit or feasibility of an idea or technology.  You retain the rights to the intellectual property.
And the opportunity to obtain additional funding to continue technology development.  Phase II awards could last for up to two years.  They expand upon the phase I results.  Prototype development is usually up to $2 million for 24 months.
Phase III is the period during which your phase II innovation moves from the laboratory into the marketplace.  There's no SBIR funding for this phase.  And you must find funding in the private sector.  Or secure it from other non‑SBIR federal agency funds to continue the development.
So to be eligible for SBIR or STTR, you need to be a small business that is U.S.‑owned.  You can be a U.S. citizen.  You can be a U.S. permanent resident.  You need to have fewer than 500 people.
Your research needs to be done in the United States.  It need to be R & D focused.  And there are investor ownerships that we need to think about for SBIR and STTR.
So the differences between SBIR and STTR.  The partnering requirements for SBIR, this permits partnering.  STTR requires you to have a nonprofit research institution partner.  That could be someone in a university or a federally funded research and development center.
The principal investigator for SBIR must be primarily employed.  That means more than 50% of the time.  With the small business.  The PI for STTR, the PI may be employed either by the small business, your company, or by the research institution.
The work requirements, you can subcontract up to 33% of a phase I SBIR.  And up to 50% of a phase II SBIR.  The minimum for STTR is 40%.  The small business needs to do 40%.  30% must be done by the research institution.
The program size, SBIR is $3 billion.  And STTR is $453 billion.  For VC ownership.  For SBIR, you may be allowed to have VC ownership.  But not for STTR.  STTR no VC ownership.
There are 11 agencies that participate in SBIR.  And six agencies that participate in STTR.  Meaning that they have more than $1 billion for their R & D research.  And for STTR, their extramural R & D budget is $100 million.
Let's talk about whether or not this is right for you.  The qualifications include you are U.S. owned and operated.  You have fewer than 500 employees.  And you are focused on R & D in the United States.
The considerations include ‑‑ it takes around 150 to 160 hours to write your first SBIR or STTR proposal.  You need to have a qualified PI on your team.  The PI is the principal investigator.
You need to have an innovate solution.  And you need to have research‑based applications.  Eligibility.  Can you apply if you have already developed a solution?  The answer is no.
SBIR and STTR programs fund innovative research and development.  The purpose is not to retroactively pay a company for development that may have already been accomplished.  It's okay to have done related work.  You probably will have done some related work.
You can investigate the application of an existing or even patented technology to new uses.  The expectation is that you will have good research.  That will lead to a commercial product.  That will also benefit the nation.
For the National Science Foundation, I can tell you that that's very important.  The principal investigator.  Your PI eligibility includes ‑‑ this is a single individual.  Who will serve as the principal investigator.
They have overall responsibility for the project.  They need to be credible in terms of their education and their work.  And program management experience.  This means you do not have to have a Ph.D. be your PI.
You can use someone who maybe has a Bachelor's degree or something else.  If they have a lot of experience in the field in which they're working.  And you can demonstrate that on their bio.  They need to be primarily employed by the applicant small business.  That's your business.  During the award period.
The PI cannot be a full‑time ‑‑ they can not be full time employed elsewhere during the SBIR award period.  The PI can be employed by the educational institution or the small business if you're applying for STTR funding.  These are a few questions to consider for your proposal success.  Have you participated in an I‑Corps program?
If you don't know what I‑Corps is, you should become familiar with that.  I‑Corps is a program that was established by NSF and Stanford University many years ago.  This is a customer discovery program.  You go out.  You talk to people.
You find out what their current concerns are related to what you're working on.  What related work have your PI and team done in this area?  We talked about can you suggest something that you've already done?  You can't.
But you've likely already worked in this area.  And that's fine.  Do you have any conflicts of interest that may prevent you from bidding on an SBIR or STTR proposal?  And do you have prior, current or pending support of similar proposals or awards?
This means if you apply to two different agencies with the same proposal, everything is basically the same.  You want to make sure you let each agency know that you've applied to another agency.  Because you will only get funding from one of those.  You don't want to take funding from both agencies.
Because the federal government does not like to pay twice for one piece of work.  Is there any peer‑reviewed research regarding the feasibility of what you plan to propose?  So, your peer‑reviewed research, you should know what's available out there.  And you need to have a list.
Do you think there could be any patents resulting from your participation in the SBIR/STTR program?  It's fine if you have patents coming out of this.  You just want to think about how is that going to work with your business?  Do you require and have access to the right facilities and equipment for research?
So, you can answer no to this question.  But you should have an idea of where you're going to find the facilities and equipment.  If you need help with that, TEDCO can help you with that.  I'm just going to say this right now.
We have a program called DefTech.  Where we can help connect you with a federal lab.  If you need facilities and equipment.  Have you thought of how you would commercialize this technology?  And what would be the commercial benefits?
No matter what you're writing, SBIR or STTR, to the Department of Energy or National Science Foundation or to DoD, you need to think about what the commercial benefits would be of whatever it is you're developing.  And, finally, will you be able to gather letters of support?  I can tell you right now, the National Science Foundation is not very interested in letters of support.
What they found is that letters of support tend to be more, yeah, this sounds like a good idea.  Than, yes, I'm going to allow you to use our facility.  For X amount of hours.  For whatever it is you can give them in return.
This slide is on finding the right agency.  So when you do this, you want to Google for search terms related to your work.  That means if you're in a certain area, Google that term.  Whatever it is you're working in.  Google that.
Find additional search terms.  Then you can go to the SBA award data page.  And get information on who has already done this work.  You can use quotation marks around any phrases that you put into the search criteria.
You can search by important criteria.  You can see the number of awards per agency.  And the search list will provide you with a list of all awards from all time.  From like 1982, I believe, up to today that include your search term.
That means somebody has funded someone to do some type of work.  So, once you see the work listed, you can click on it.  You'll get all kinds of information.  A specific award will provide details and contact information for the PI.
So, you can get the PI's contact information.  You can ask them about anything.  You can ask them how they did their work.  Who they worked with.  Anything like that.
You can also speak to the topic manager.  So, know the window of communication.  How does the Department of Energy work versus the DoD?  Versus NSF?  Versus NIH.  Draft a simple email requesting a call.  Do not ask your question in the email.
You don't want to do that.  Because you want them to respond to you.  And set up a meeting with you.  If you ask them the question in the email, they may answer you with yes or no.  That's not going to be helpful.
You want to have a lot of questions for them.  Drafting them a simple email is a very, very good idea.  So, what's the next thing that you do?  You want to do a lot of research on the agency that you're applying to.
Find out what types of projects they have been funding recently.  Who have they been funding?  Does their most recent strategy align with your goal?  You should have a strategy for your company.  You should know the direction you want to go.
You want to make sure that the organization you're working with is aligned with your strategic goals.  Do you need to find an internal partner?  I'll give you an example.  The Air Force, I believe, offers a small award for companies to go find a partner.
That means someone that's already in the Air Force that would be interested in the technology that you're developing.  Which events does the agency host and attend?  You can find out a lot of information if you attend their ask me anything sessions, for example.  DoD does a lot of those.
Carefully read the solicitation.  I'm going to say that multiple times.  Because it's very important.  And when you respond to them, be sure you're using their language in your proposal.
If they read their language, they're going to understand what you're talking about.  This is planning your 150 hours for success.  Get your registrations done first.  So if you haven't started that already, you might think about that.  Go to Sam.gov first.  Begin your registrations.
Read the solicitation.  I'm going to say that many times.  You need to read the solicitation.  The whole solicitation.  You want to put your team together.  And develop a schedule.
You want to include time for reviews.  So, if you have a month or two months to get your proposal ready, make sure you allow three days, at least ‑‑ at least three days to be able to submit your proposal.  The reason you want to submit at least three days early is because a lot of times the internet gets backed up.
And people are waiting to send their solicitation in.  It can be very, very frustrating.  Create a compliance matrix.  You can use AI to help you with this.  I'm going to talk about AI a little bit.
Tell AI what you're working on and what you need.  Put your solicitation into AI.  Ask it to build you a compliance matrix.  Check for pre‑submission requirements.  So the DOE and NSF both require you do something first.
NSF requires you to develop a project pitch.  And then they will invite you to submit a proposal.  Or they'll come back and say, we have questions.  Or they'll tell you, no, it's not a good fit.
DOE asks that you submit a letter of intent.  They will come back to you.  Saying, we got your letter of intent.  That's about all you get from them.  But they do require that first.
Develop an outline.  That's based on the solicitation.  And, again, AI can help you with this.  I strongly recommend using AI for that.
Put it in your calendar.  Make sure you schedule time every day.  To write your proposal.  Forget grammar and usage when you're first getting started.
When you plan your color team review.  You can do a pink review.  Which is when you're 60% ready.  You can do a red review.  Which is when you're 90% ready.  You can do a gold review.  When you're 100% ready.
You're ready to push the button.  To say submit.  When you get to the red review, you want to pay attention to grammar, definitely.  But up to that point, I would say most of your writing, don't worry about grammar.  Don't worry about usage.  Just get your thoughts on paper.
Again, read the solicitation thoroughly.  The department of the Navy calls their solicitation document a Broad Area Announcement.  So you'll search through the BAA to find relevant instructions.  The Department of Energy has a separate topics document.  You want to read that document thoroughly.
In the DOE's document, you can find ‑‑ identify agency‑specific support, if that's offered.  Identify topic author contact information.  You can find keywords.  Identify additional requirements.
And you can use DOE topic language from their specific topic in your response.  An example is the topic is C59‑12.  Atmospheric measurement technology.  This includes a subtopic called autonomous unattended atmospheric measurements from marine platforms.
You'll find lots of language you can use.  And exactly what they're looking for.  In that subtopic, there are three links to additional resources, for example.  The NOAA program.  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.  Science RoCS.  I don't know what that stands for.  And they offer a workshop.
All of those three resources are listed under the subtopic autonomous unattended atmospheric measurements from marine platforms.  And you'll also find there their contact email address.  When you see the email address, you can start thinking about what do I want to ask them?  And put your email together.
The email that says, can we have a meeting, please?  How do you develop a compelling, compliant and competitive proposal?  There are just a couple of hints here.  There's pay attention to font and margin guidelines.
When they say use an 11‑point font or nothing more than an 11‑point font, that's what you're going to use.  You're going to ensure the text in your graphics remain compliant.  Usually graphics can't be more than an 8‑point font, which is very small.  But you want to make sure your graphics are not smaller than that.
You want to build and use a compliance matrix.  To make sure you covered everything in the solicitation.  Know the agency.  And use their language back to them in your proposal when you're writing.
Know your competition.  Know your research topic.  And, remember, you're telling a story.  So, make it compelling.
Reviewers are tired people.  So, make it readable.  When I say reviewers are tired people, I'm talking about people that have already done their day job.  And now they're reading your proposal.  Because they happen to be a reviewer for NSF or NIH.
Follow the instructions.  And do what they ask.  So there are tips and a final discussion here.  You can use tools to help you with this.
There are timers, such as Pomodoro that times you for, I believe, 50 minutes.  Then it has ten minutes where you take a break.  Or five minutes where you take a break.  Then you go for 50 minutes.  Five‑minute break.
You can use Otter, ChatGPT and Gemini for your proposal writing.  Or your solicitation development.  If you need a matrix, you can use these tools for that.  You can record on your phone.
Make sure that you read the solicitation multiple times.  I know I've said that three times at least so far.  It's very important.  And it's surprising how many people don't read the solicitation.  So you're well ahead of the curve if you're reading the solicitation and you understand it.
Read what you write out loud.  You want to listen to how your proposal sounds.  Yeah.  I'm thinking for people that can't hear.  How do you do that?  I don't know.
I can tell you that reading a proposal out loud helps you understand whether or not you're getting your message across.  And in different sections.  You want to assemble your review team.  I talked about the pink team.
That's where grammar and usage do not matter.  The red team, your budget is complete.  Your grammar is correct.  Your bios are finished.  Someone can look at everything.
The gold team is say final review by the team right before you submit your proposal.  There are other colors that could go in here as well.  But pink, red and gold are very important.
TEDCO offers an SBIR/STTR proposal lab.  This is the Federal & State Technology Partnership Program.  It's funded through a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration.  This provides funding to organizations that execute programs that increase the number of SBIR/STTR proposals that lead to an increase in the number of awards from women and socially economically disadvantaged individuals. 
And small businesses in underrepresented areas.  That's typically states like Maryland.  Where a lot of our population is in rural communities.
To find additional support, we have SBA‑funded organizations through FAST and the GAFC awardees.  There's a link to each of these in this deck.  If you click on FAST and GAFC awardees, for example, it will take you to a list of current awardees.
The Small Business Development Centers.  This is a great place for you.  It doesn't matter where your business is right now.  The Small Business Development Centers are all over the United States.
They're in every state and every county.  Usually, they're associated with a university or community college.  You can find your SBDC here.  Your APEX accelerators are ‑‑ APEX used to be the PTAB.
This is a group that can help you with your proposal.  They can work with you.  And offer you one‑on‑one assistance.  You can check the agency's website.  The Department of Energy, for example, offers phase 0 support.
In Maryland, Virginia, the District of Columbia and Delaware, we offer ‑‑ TEDCO offers BRIDGE technical assistance.  BRIDGE is a program that helps you with your legal, accounting and financial resources.  For Maryland businesses looking for SBIR/STTR support, you can look at the Maryland entrepreneur hub.  That is on our website.
We developed this with the Maryland Department of Commerce a number of years ago.  We have our proposal lab in addition to that.  Where we offer NSF support.  We offer Maryland technical assistance.
TEDCO, first, is a quasi‑state organization.  We were formed by state legislation 26 years ago.  And our technical assistance is something that is funded by the state.  We can work with you on Department of Defense, NIH and I believe Department of Energy is who we're looking to support those contracts right now.
Technical and business assistance is something that is offered by the Maryland Department of ‑‑ no, I'm sorry.  It's offered by Congress.  This funding is offered through every agency that offers SBIR and STTR.  The difference is sometimes their TBA support comes from the agency.
For example, the Army research lab used to have a TBA provider.  They did certain things for their phase I companies.  And certain things for their phase II companies.
For Maryland, we offer TBA support as well.  You apply for TBA.  In your proposal, you add it into your budget.  I'll say this.  Sometimes it's on top of the budget amount.  If it's $305,000 from NSF, if you're applying for phase II, you can apply for an additional $50,000.
Actually, your phase II would be $1.5 million, I think, or above that.  So, you can add your $50,000 of TBA support on to that.  And say you want Maryland Technology Development Center to offer TBA.  We will work with you on that.
The Maryland matching fund is coming.  That program is coming very soon.  We will have $1.15 million, I believe.  Somewhere around there.  $1.3 million that we can give out to companies that apply for a matching funds program.
That's going to begin around the 17th of April.  So, next week.  We're hoping once the legislation is completely finished.  And this page is a picture of me.  It's a terrible picture.  But that's who I am.  Kim Mozingo, Vice President of federal programs.  My email address is kmozingo@TEDCOmd.com.  My phone number is 240‑416‑0012.  And that is the last slide that I have.
At this point, I want to answer a few questions.  If you have questions, put them in the chat.  That would be great.
>> LEXI JONES: Kim, this is Lexi from NDI.  I haven't seen any question come in.  Oh, one did come in.  There was one question that came in before the webinar that you might want to go over.
Before we do that, I would like to just launch our post‑test.  That will give folks maybe a minute to think of their questions.  And pop them in the chat for you.
>> KIMBERLY MOZINGO: Sure.
>> LEXI JONES: Everyone who was here at the very beginning, I'm going to launch that same poll again.  It should only take a minute or two.  Let us know how you feel about these questions now that you've heard this wonderful presentation.  Then we will move into question and answer.
Kim can answer any questions that might have popped into the chat while everyone is doing the poll.  We'll give it a minute or two.
We'll give it another couple of minutes.  I see a few responses coming in.  Thank you for sticking it out with us.  All right.  I'm going to leave the poll up.  Kim, you can start addressing the questions that have come in.
>> KIMBERLY MOZINGO: The first question I have is, is the technical assistance application open?  No, technical assistance is not open yet.  We're waiting until the rules have been approved by the Maryland state legislature.
Where can we find specific solicitation?  There are a number of ways to do that.  My favorite used to be to go to SBIR.gov.  Which lists the solicitations that are currently open from anyone.
Although, having said that, you can go to ‑‑ if you want DoD, you can go to DoD's SBIR website.  Or to the Navy's website.  Or the Air Force.  Or the Army.
So where you can find specific solicitations, there's a lot of information on that.  And I'm sorry I can't really answer that specifically.  Are you allowed to do ‑‑ by Pendra (?).  Is it allowed to do two SBIR or agency, tech for NSF and energy for DOE?
You can do that, yes.  Definitely.  You can apply to NSF for one ‑‑ on one topic.  And apply to the Department of Energy on another topic.  That's not a problem at all.
We did have some questions with registration.  Do you have a minimum number of years you need to be in business?  The answer is no.  There is no minimum number of years at all.
Anybody can apply.  Matter of fact, if you are applying for NSF, you can write your pitch while you're being set up as a business.  You would have six months to respond.  Once you get the invitation to respond with a proposal.
You can be working on your business at the same time.  What stage of eligibility are you in, if you have an initial prototype ready?  What stage of eligibility are you in?  That depends on the prototype that you're building.
If you have a drug, you could be at a TRL II.  It really depends.  If you ask that question, can you ask that again maybe in a different way?  Where I can help you?
Let's see.  So this doesn't meet deaf people's needs.  Do we have any expert skilled deaf person with SBA involved in grant screening?  I don't know anyone that does that.  NDI likely does.
Lexi, do you know if you have someone who can help a deaf person with their SBA awards?
>> LEXI JONES: I just saw that question pop into the chat.  I'm going to put my general email in there.  If you would, reach out to us.  We will help you to find some support.
>> KIMBERLY MOZINGO: That's fantastic.  So is there any peer support?  Where business owners can talk through the process.  That's a good question.
There is support through the Small Business Administration.  If you belong to ‑‑ if you have a GAFC loan, you can work with other people on this.  Yes, definitely.
>> LEXI JONES: I think that's the last question in the chat.  If anyone has other questions, we do have a few more minutes.  If not, we're happy to give you all a few minutes back in your afternoon.  No one ever minds that, right?
I do want to thank everyone for joining us.  Before you leave, Ruth from NDI small business team is going to go over some of the other services that we're able to provide.  And talk about our next few webinars that are coming up.
That will give everyone a minute.  If you have another question, pop it in the chat.  We can always come back to Kim after we've gone through some of the closeout.  And we'll make sure we get your questions answered.
Ruth, if you're ready, we'll move to the next slide.  And go over some of NDI's other small business services.
>> RUTH CHAVEZ: Thank you.  Thank you to all for joining us today.  Before we wrap up, I want to highlight some key opportunities and resources available to you through our NDI small business hub program.
We recently received a five‑year grant, Inclusive Ventures: 21st Century Strategies for Entrepreneurs with Disabilities.  Which began in October.  And will support the state vocational rehabilitation agencies in promoting self‑employment.  Our goal is to equip counselors with the training and resources to better assist individuals with disabilities in launching and growing their business.
We also work with the disability providers and entrepreneurial support organizations.  To enhance those programs.  Next slide, please.
Some of our valuable resources.  If you visit disabilitysmallbusiness.org, you can find a wealth of information.  You can find webinars on various topics.  Podcasts, success stories.  And links to our valuable small business resources.
You also have the option to sign up for monthly newsletters.  To stay updated on upcoming events and opportunities.  And all of these links are live.  You'll be able to click on the links once Lexi sends out the slide deck to everyone.  Next slide, please.
Some of our upcoming events.  We have sort of like a part two of today's webinar.  We're going to deep a little bit into the understanding of the grant application.  And proposal writing.
Effective grant writing and application tips masterclass will be held March 19 from 1:30 to 3:30 eastern standard time.  And following that webinar, April 9th, we will have a topic on empower your business with an ABLE tax account.  That will be more on how to align your ABLE account in helping to get your business started.  Specifically if you're receiving SSI, SSDI, or have specific income limitations for those requirements.  Next slide.
And this is our dedicated small business team.  Nikki Powis is director of small business programs, Caroline Bolas, small business specialist, Ruth Chavez, myself, business development specialist and Lexi Jones, our small business navigator.
If you have any additional questions, feel free to reach out to us.  We appreciate your time today.  And encourage to you stay engaged with our programs.  And stay connected with our newsletters.
>> LEXI JONES: Wonderful.  Thank you so much, Ruth.  Kim, I didn't see any additional questions in the chat.  I think that does it for today.  We will absolutely share your contact information in the follow‑up email that goes out to everyone who registered.
So, if you do think of a question after we end, which is usually how it goes, right?  You're welcome to email Kim.  She can get back to you.  And help you get connected to the information you need.
As always, you're welcome to reach out to NDI small business team.  We're happy to help you find support.  And provide support where we can.  So, thank you, all, very much for your time.  Kim, thank you so much for joining us.
And really explaining a complicated topic in a way that hopefully breaks it down.  And feels more approachable for people we work with.
>> KIMBERLY MOZINGO: Yes.  Thank you very much for having me.
>> LEXI JONES: It was a great event.  We look forward to working with you again in the future.  Everybody, have a wonderful afternoon.  Bye, everybody.
[ Concluded 2:01 P.M. CT ]

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