U.S. Department of Agriculture Small Business Innovation Research Program Update
The USDA has announced some interesting information recently:
Topics “8.6 Rural and Community Development” and “8.12 Small and Mid‑Sized Farms” will allow off the shelf technologies.
As many of you know there has been a significant shift in the USDA and NIFA and many of the previous employees have elected to resign positions rather than move to Kansas. It’s always a good idea to get to know them before you submit a proposal. The National Program Managers are listed below by topic:
8.1 – Daniel Cassidy (patrick.cassidy@usda.gov)
8.2 – Robert Nowierski (robert.nowierski@usda.gov)
8.3 – Robert Smith (robert.m.smith@usda.gov)
8.4 – Jim Dobrowolski (james.dobrowolski@usda.gov)
8.5 – Max Teplitski (max.teplitski@usda.gov) and DeirdraChester (deirdra.chester@usda.gov)
8.6 – Caroline Crocoll (caroline.crocoll@usda.gov)
8.7 – Adele Turzillo (adele.turzillo@usda.gov)
8.8 – Ed Kaleikau (edward.kaleiku@usda.gov)
8.12 – Denis Ebodaghe (denis.ebodaghe@usda.gov)
8.13 – Steven Thomson (steven.j.thomson@usda.gov)
The USDA SBIR program Office was also kind enough to release the following data. As you can see the success rate for 2019 Phase I awards was only 10%; however, the success rate for resubmissions was 27%. That’s significant!