More than six months after they expired, the federal Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs will again provide needed funding to support America’s small businesses.
President Trump on April 13 signed into law congressional legislation that reauthorizes the SBIR and STTR programs for five years. The bill signing came nearly a month after the legislation passed in Congress, a delay the White House has not explained.
The president’s support brings back programs that have delivered more than $81 billion in research and development (R&D) funding to more than 34,000 small businesses nationwide, helping drive technological breakthroughs since they began in 1982.
Industry and government officials praised the revival of SBIR and STTR, which underwent several reforms during the congressional reauthorization process. The programs had expired in late September after Congress initially failed to reauthorize them, a casualty of the broader government shutdown fight.
“The SBIR program is a critical tool that provides early-stage funding to technology startups and serves as a pipeline to deliver the best technology to our warfighters and federal agencies,” Eric Blatt, executive director of the Alliance for Commercial Technology in Government and partner at Scale LLP, told MeriTalk.
He added that the funding lapse “has been challenging for companies, but we are pleased that the program has now been reauthorized.”
Kelly Loeffler, administrator of the Small Business Administration (SBA), which helps administer the SBIR and STTR programs across multiple federal agencies, said the United States “leads the world in scientific breakthroughs and transformative technology – and thanks to this law, SBIR and STTR will continue to power entrepreneurs who are building the industrial base of the future.”
“For decades, these cross-agency programs have enabled small, innovative businesses to take bold ideas to commercialization, bolster our national security, and ensure America leads the world in defense, energy, agriculture, biotechnology, space exploration, and other critical industries,” she said.
Before the programs lapsed, Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., ranking member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, released an analysis of how the lapses would harm small businesses.
The document said the cancellation of mid-stage projects would cause “dozens of agencies and hundreds of small businesses to lose hundreds of millions – if not more – spent on unfinished” R&D.
For the Department of Defense alone, it warned, more than $1.6 billion in investments in warfighter capability technology “would be lost or delayed.”
It was bipartisan negotiations between Markey and Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, that produced The Small Business Innovation and Economic Security Act, which extends the SBIR and STTR programs through Sept. 30, 2031.
The revived programs include several reforms that SBA said “strengthen program integrity, protect against foreign adversaries, expand access to new innovative businesses, and ensure taxpayer dollars deliver measurable results.”
For example, the changes strengthen foreign due diligence requirements, with agencies asked to notify small businesses when they’ve been flagged for potential foreign risk. Recipients are also now held accountable for producing cutting-edge technologies and capabilities.