The Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship (SBE) passed by a vote of 19 to 0, their 'SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2008'' aka S. 3362.  This is a completely new bill and not related to H.R. 5819, the House's SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act passed in the House, April 2008.  Here are some of the major points of the bill: 

1.  Award Amounts - Both SBIR and STTR raised to $150k phase I, and $1m phase II, with the ability to exceed the guidelines by a maximum of 50%.  The agencies must report and justify all awards exceeding the guidelines. 

2.  Increase in SBIR/STTR Cap (allocation) - SBIR will be increased from 2.5% to 3.5% at a rate of .1% over 10 years, EXCEPT for NIH, which will stay at 2.5%.  STTR will double from 0.3% to 0.6% over 6 years. 

3.  VC Eligibility - A "small business" that is majority owned and controlled by multiple VCs will be eligible to participate in the SBIR program under certain conditions:  No single VC can own more than 49% of the small business entity;  the VC must be a United States Venture Capital Company; the VC owned small business must register with the SBA when they submit an SBIR proposal.  The NIH will be limited to awarding not more than 18% of their SBIR award funding to such VC owned small businesses, and the remaining 10 agencies are limited to 8%. 

4.  Length of Reauthorization - 14 years, resulting in new sunset dates of September 30, 2022, for SBIR and September 30, 2023, for STTR.

5.  Direct Access to Phase II (bypassing phase I) - A defiant "no no"

6.  Crossover between agencies - A phase I at one agency becoming a phase II at another is permitted.

7.  Crossover between SBIR and STTR - A phase I of SBIR can become a Phase II of STTR, or vice versa.

8.  Commercialization Pilot Program (DoD) - Is supported.

9.  Commercialization Pilot Program (Civilian Agencies) - A new pilot program.

10.  Ability of a small business to partner/subcontract or enter into a CRADA with a federal laboratory or FFRDC without the need of an SBA waiver.

If the SBIR program is of  importance to you and your business, please ask your Senators to cosponsor and support S 3362.  Go to http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm choose your state from the dropdown window on the left, and click on your Senators' name.  You may want to use the local one because they will be working your districts for much of the month of August (except convention week).  Contact TREND at 907-274-7232 or email to ancap1@uaa.alaska.edu  for more information on the reauthorization effort.  You can track reauthorization news at www.zyn.com.