Call-To-Action is an initiative of: Innovation Development Institute

Reauthorization
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What is this about?
(working paper)
Proposed Phase III Demo Funding
IDI Processed Emails re. this issue
Friends and Allies
  • Industrial Research Institute
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    Resources to do the job:
    Those pushing hard for H.R. 5819 and for the Senate equivalent are experienced Capitol Hill players with high-placed inside contacts. They are able to draw down on substantial resources. Including personnel time, orchestrated media coverage and extensive use of hired lobbyists, the amount they have spent on their SBIR effort to date has already run into millions.

    Obviously, SBIR Advocates - those, like us, opposed to what HR 5819 would do - can never command the type of resources available to BIO and NVCA. Neither, frankly, do we need them. We are not a formally organized Trade Association with all the overhead and support structure that implies. In our case particularly, this is project specific effort. When SBIR is reauthorized at something closer to what it must be to continue as a critical economic development resource, our job will be over and we can return to normal business operations.

    The urgency and strong commitment to the cause - not for the first time - is making us a force to be reckoned with. We will have impact. HOWEVER, that said, this type of concerted effort is time-consuming and resource demanding. Just since the days before the House vote on HR 5819, this effort has engaged almost all our attentions.

    The bottom line here is .... to continue to do this job over the next few weeks and months we need your personal involvement and your financial support.

    Can we count on you?

    What would my money be used for?
    These contributions are being used
    • To keep the SBIR Community informed and, to the extent possible, actively engaged in this critical SBIR Reauthorization effort. This included the original Call to Action email which went out to over 8000 currently involved SBIR awardees (17,000 emails) on April 21-22 alerting them to the imminent vote by the Full House of H.R. 5819 on April 23,2008. Those managing the SBIR Reauthorization bill had intended to get to a vote quietly when few Members would be aware and a voice vote would suffice. Instead, calls and emails from many hundreds of SBIR awardees from all over the country arguing against the bill forced a full roll-call vote. We lost - badly - but the fight was bought into the open and now engages farore of the SBIR Community.
    • To intitutute and manage a carefully structured campaign of Member contact and education.
    • To work with those Awardees willing and able to host particular Members towards ensuring that those elected officials properly understand the importance of SBIR and the irreparable damage passage of HR 5819 could do in excluding from effective SBIR partiiciaption the overwhelming percentage of the current SBIR community..
    • To support the development and distribution of a series of informational pamphlets (10-15 pages each) and Powerpoint slides drawing down on the powerful and comprehensive SBIR-STTR databases developed primarily from personal and business resources of the Innovation Development Institute. Called the SBIR Achievement series, these informational pieces are will address topics like
      • The Extent and Form of VC Activity in the Federal SBIR Program
      • Examining Aspects of the SBIR-STTR Track record in whichever State - potentially one for each state
      • The Economic Impact of SBIR: a by-State analysis
      • Intellectual Property: a major SBIR output
      • SBIR-STTR: a factor in high-tech employment
        • These materials are explicitly designed
          • to be put out there for general use in telling the SBIR story to the Congress, to the Media and within the Community itself with a program-wide approach that is currently not available from anywhere else
          • to empower the grass-roots awardee base that, if properly marshalled and supported, in my judgment is our most powerful - largely unused - asset and
          • to anchor and open up the discussion of what may be the most important discussion about SBIR - the major contribution that this important technology development resource has made to the health of the United States economy
    • To work with the various other organizations and individuals committed to achieving a sustained SBIR-STTR political presence.