NIH Efforts for Supporting Small Business Entrepreneurs from Diverse Backgrounds

Each year the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) various institutes award over $1.2 billion in funding to entrepreneurs and small businesses to further their efforts to support the NIH's biomedical research mission through commercialized means. The SBIR/STTR awards are one of the few NIH awards open to professionals that do not require a doctoral degree. In pursuing this award, which is different from academic research, NIH and each IC have created a number of technical assistance entrepreneurial programs to assist applicants in their success. Furthermore, there are a number of resources and new funding opportunities geared towards supporting applicants from diverse backgrounds, such as historical black colleges and universities, tribal universities, and minority focused health accelerators. The speakers for this panel will discus the NIH SBIR/STTR program, it's resources for supporting applicants from diverse backgrounds, and provide examples of companies that have benefited.