An Assessment of the SBIR Program at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (2009) / Chapter Skim
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2 Findings and Recommendations
2 Findings and Recommendations
Pages 26-41
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From page 26... ...
Congress expanded the purposes to "emphasize the program's goal of increasing private-sector commercialization developed through federal research and development and to improve the Federal government's dissemination of information concerning small business innovation, particularly with regard to woman-owned business concerns and by socially and economically disadvantaged small business concerns." 26
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According to the NASA Commercial Metrics Survey, from 1983 to 1996, NASA SBIR projects created goods and services that generated over $2.3 billion in revenues in the private economy. Nearly half (46 percent) of all sales resulting from Phase II awards went to markets other than the federal government. • Commercial success is concentrated.
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From page 28... ...
• According to the NRC Project Manager Survey: Sixty-three percent of surveyed projects were deemed by NASA's Contracting Officer's Technical Representatives (COTR) to have significant noncommercial, intrinsic research value.10 34.6 percent of surveyed projects resulted were deemed by NASA COTRs to have resulted in a product or service of commercial value.11 2.
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1. he NASA SBIR program has successfully supported the creation T and diffusion of knowledge by small companies: • Patents. A quarter of projects responding to the NRC Phase II Survey reported filing at least one related patent; a fifth received at least one patent.19 13 SeeTables 4-7, 4-8, 4-9 and 4-10.
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21 SeeNRC Phase II Survey, Question 31 and Table 4-22. 22 See NRC Firm Survey, Question 1.
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S • Over two-thirds (68 percent) of SBIR Phase II award recipients say that they definitely or probably would not have undertaken the funded research project without the SBIR funding.28 • While the impact of the award is significant, just under a fifth of the respondents to the NRC Phase II Survey (18 percent)
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• Must account for a shift in responsibility for achieving mission purpose use from SBIR to NASA centers and NASA's scientists and engineers. • Requires that each NASA center have the capacity for identifying and support the SBIR projects best matched to the center's high priority technology needs, regardless of where in the country those projects are.
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election. NASA centers provide a ranked listing to the Program Man S agement Office, which prepares a selection of options for the Source Selection Official, who make the final decisions.
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J. Understanding multiple-award winners: The path to successful SBIR award outcomes is non-linear and technologies often require multiple awards to reach fruition.
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D • Complementarities between the NASA and DoD SBIR projects should be encouraged. NASA SBIR projects often find homes in DoD during Phase III.
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Langley Research Center program that helps link SBIR projects to A NASA prime contractors that could become potential customers. 41 For example, see the case of ARACOR in Appendix E
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• Funds might be drawn from the existing set-aside for the SBIR pro gram to carry out these activities. • Congress may consider marginally increasing the set-aside for the program, currently at 2.5 percent of external research budgets, with the goal of providing management resources necessary to maximize 43 Bestpractices include the Navy's strategic approach to procurement and NSF's Phase I-B and Phase II-B supplemental awards.
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The NASA SBIR program should develop a D series of specific data objectives -- identifying both the data needed to run the program well and the means of acquiring those data. Possible bench marks include: • The percentage of companies achieving Phase III.
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The proposed annual report noted above could R become a focus for wider efforts to develop improved internal assessment capabilities that can be used to enhance program operations. It could also tie proposed improvements to evidence-based analysis and, for example, include an evaluation of the predictive power of selection scoring with regard top commercialization and other outcomes.
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• The stronger orientation towards infusion may push NASA toward opting for lower risk SBIR projects. A balance must be struck between encouraging and funding riskier projects at lower Technology Readi ness Levels (TRL)
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FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 41 • NASA faces substantial change as resources are increasingly focused on the Moon-Mars mission. The result is declining resources for R&D in other parts of NASA, especially aeronautics and earth sciences.
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