SBIR Road Tour Allows Entrepreneurs to Compete for $2.5B in Funding

The state's science and technology entrepreneurs have an opportunity to meet with leaders of the $2.5 ­billion Small Business Innovation Research federal funding program when the SBIR Road Tour visits Arkansas on April 19. The tour is coming to the University of Arkansas at Little Rock to promote the federal SBIR program. SBIR and its sister program, the Small Business Technology Transfer, provide $2.5 billion annually to small companies for state-of-the-art research and product development. In 2015, $7 million of that went to companies in Arkansas. The Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center will host the event at the Donald W. Reynolds Center for Business and Economic Development at UALR. SBIR program managers from nine federal agencies will speak and then meet one-on-one with entrepreneurs. Agencies scheduled to participate include the Department of Agriculture, Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration and military branches. Scheduled to visit 15 states, the tour is returning to Arkansas for the first time since 2002. According to Rebecca Norman, innovation consultant and SBIR specialist at the Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center, U.S. Small Business Administration Administrator Maria Contreras-Sweet is expected to fly in from Washington, D.C. to kick off the event since Arkansas is the first stop on the tour. "...
Source: Arkansas Business - Health Care - Category: American Health Source Type: news