Your science is defensible, but the proposal has to satisfy a review panel, a program officer, and a compliance office that each read for entirely different things.
Research funding rewards specificity about mechanism, aims, and feasibility, and it punishes proposals that treat the budget, the data plan, and the eligibility rules as paperwork. We work with investigators and technical founders on federal research and commercialization awards, with access to Ph.D.-level expertise across scientific fields when a draft needs a reader who can argue the science rather than summarize it. The mechanics matter as much as the hypothesis.
The federal research and commercialization programs worth your time
These are the mechanisms technical organizations actually compete in, with the structural rules that decide eligibility before merit is ever considered.
SBIR and STTR: phases and dollars
Eleven federal agencies participate. As of April 2026 the SBA guideline amounts are up to $323,090 for Phase I and up to $2,153,927 for Phase II. Phase I establishes feasibility, Phase II develops and demonstrates the prototype, and Phase III is commercialization work funded entirely from non-SBIR sources, federal or private, with no statutory dollar ceiling.
SBIR versus STTR, and who can apply
STTR requires a nonprofit research institution partner performing at least 30 percent of the work, with at least 40 percent at the small business. SBIR requires no partner and caps outsourcing at 33 percent in Phase I and 50 percent in Phase II. On SBIR the principal investigator's primary employment must be with the company; on STTR the PI may sit at either organization.
Small business eligibility, precisely
The applicant must be a for-profit small business concern with 500 or fewer employees including affiliates, more than 50 percent directly owned and controlled by US citizens or permanent residents or by other qualifying small businesses, performing the work in the United States. Universities and nonprofits cannot be prime applicants on either program, only subawardees.
NSF SBIR/STTR under solicitation NSF 26-510
NSF requires an invited Project Pitch before you may submit. Phase I runs up to $305,000 over 6 to 18 months. Phase II runs up to $1,250,000 over roughly 24 months and is open only to NSF Phase I awardees. Fast-Track reaches $1,555,555 combined. Voluntary committed cost sharing is prohibited, and the PI must be at least 51 percent employed by the small business.
NIH: SBIR, STTR, and R01
NIH SBIR Phase I typically runs 6 months to 2 years and Phase II 1 to 3 years, against the same SBA guideline amounts. On the research side, applications requesting up to $250,000 in annual direct costs use modular budgets in $25,000 increments, while SBIR, STTR, and foreign applicants must submit detailed budgets regardless. The salary cap reduces awards quietly if ignored.
DOE Office of Science annual open call
The fiscal year 2026 continuation solicitation makes up to $500 million available across Advanced Scientific Computing Research, Basic Energy Sciences, Biological and Environmental Research, Fusion Energy Sciences, High Energy Physics, Nuclear Physics, and Isotope R&D. Awards run from $50,000 to $5 million, eligibility is unrestricted, and it remains open through September 30, 2026. Program manager contact is the real gate.
Where we add value on a technical proposal
We do not write your science. We make sure the sections reviewers use to judge feasibility, and the sections compliance offices use to judge eligibility, are as rigorous as the science is.
Mechanism selection and agency fit
The same technology can be a poor fit at one agency and a strong fit at another, based on mission relevance, maturity stage, and whether the office funds discovery or translation. We map the work against specific solicitations and program priorities, then advise on sequencing: which mechanism to pursue first so that the next one becomes credible.
Proposal architecture and technical review
We structure aims, milestones, risk mitigation, and the commercialization narrative against the criteria the panel is actually scoring. With access to Ph.D.-level expertise across scientific fields, we can put a reader on your draft who knows the field well enough to find the gap a reviewer would find, while there is still time to close it.
Budget, subawards, and eligibility diligence
We build budgets that survive negotiation: personnel effort tied to the work plan, subaward and consortium structures that satisfy the work percentage rules, and indirect cost treatment matching your negotiated rate agreement or your de minimis election. On small business awards we verify ownership and size eligibility before the writing starts, not after.
Why technically strong applications fail
Panels do not usually reject good science. They reject proposals where eligibility, feasibility, or the commercialization path is not demonstrated at the level the mechanism demands.
Eligibility breaks on ownership or size
Size is measured including affiliates, so an investor's portfolio or a parent company can push you past 500 employees. Majority ownership by a single venture capital operating company, hedge fund, or private equity firm breaks the ownership test outright, and only some agencies use the authority to fund firms majority-owned by multiple such investors. Cap tables get checked.
Readiness level does not match the mechanism
Phase I funds feasibility, not a product that already works, and a proposal describing a mature system reads as a request to subsidize development already underway. The reverse fails just as reliably: pitching a demonstration program on bench data. Reviewers score the gap between where the technology sits and what the mechanism was built to fund.
The commercialization case is asserted, not built
Reviewers can be convinced by the science and still score the proposal down because the market analysis is generic, customer discovery is absent, the intellectual property position is unclear, or the path from Phase II to revenue depends on a Phase III funder nobody has spoken with. That section is scored, not decorative.
The obligations that attach the day you accept
Federal research awards carry an administrative and legal regime that first-time recipients routinely underestimate. These are the areas that generate findings.
Bayh-Dole and SBIR data rights
Bayh-Dole lets you elect title to subject inventions, subject to timely disclosure, a nonexclusive government license, and US manufacturing preference. Separately, SBIR and STTR data rights protect technical data generated under the award for 20 years from the date of award under SBA's 2019 policy directive. Missing a disclosure deadline can forfeit title entirely.
Data management, effort reporting, and research security
NIH and NSF both require data management and sharing plans that are assessed during review and enforced afterward. Personnel charges need documentation supporting how effort was actually distributed across projects. Disclosure of foreign support, appointments, and affiliations for senior and key personnel is now a research security requirement with real consequences for omissions.
Export control and research misconduct
Fundamental research is generally excluded from export control, but that exclusion disappears when a sponsor imposes publication restrictions or the work touches controlled technology, and deemed export rules reach foreign nationals on your own team. Institutions also need a research misconduct policy and inquiry process in place before an allegation arrives, not after.
Whether this is the right time to bring in outside help
The value of a consultant on a research proposal depends heavily on where you are. Some situations do not warrant it yet, and we will say so.
Good fit
You are a technical founder or principal investigator without a sponsored programs office behind you, or you have one that is stretched thin. You are moving from a single award into a portfolio across agencies, or entering a mechanism you have not used before, where the structural rules carry as much weight as the science.
Not yet
If you have not done customer discovery, do not have a preliminary result, or have not confirmed size and ownership eligibility, an outside writer cannot fix that. If you already hold a Phase I and your institution has experienced research administration staff, a Phase II is often better handled internally with targeted review rather than a full engagement.
What engagement looks like
We scope against your calendar and the solicitation cycle: opportunity assessment and a go or no-go recommendation first, then proposal development, budget construction, and compliance documentation. Some teams use us only for technical review and responsiveness checks against the review criteria. Others need the full build, including subaward coordination and post-award reporting.
Bring us the science. We will tell you whether the mechanism fits.
Send the technology, the stage it is at, and your entity structure. We assess eligibility and mechanism fit before proposing any scope, because on federal research awards those two answers determine everything that follows. Benjamin Dean will respond directly.
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