From the emails and received calls, we know that several of the bigger winners to whom this email was originally directed about two weeks ago heard our urgent call for your help and support - copy below. Many of you responded - but when you tried to use your credit cards on our Call to Action site to make the much needed contribution to this extensive reauthorization campaign you hit all sorts of problems with the message that 'your card is denied'.   Others among you saw the Problem Notice we posted on the site when we became aware of the problem and did not attempt to make contribution.

Finally, our very large, nationally known service provider managed to fix the problem last night - a complex problem which turned out to be of their creation but which had entirely eliminated from our account any ability to take any type of credit card.

We are now back on-line.  If you are still inclined to contribute into this effort, we really would appreciate it. As you can imagine, no income for several weeks while we have continued to work on the job to hand really bites.

https://www.inknowvation.com/Call_To_Action_SBIR_2008/Contribute.html

Campaign solidly underway:
Member interaction: While the SBTC has focused attention primarily in DC, we have continued to use our tools and resources for two primary purposes.

 
Member position: In a separate effort, we are also working on taking complete inventory of Members so that a useful listing can be compiled of the position of each on the HR 5819 issue.  Obviously, how we advise awardees to interact with their Members differs depending on whether they are strongly for (or against) current key issues and/or are not yet made up their minds.

Phase III funding: Though still a work in progress, we have also been working with the staff of particular Members to craft the development of a new type of Phase III transition funding vehicle that could pull out a significant number of the larger, late-stage projects which now account for the majority of the VC-backed company awards.  Providing a seamless transition to an alternative funding pool could effectively release significant SBIR resources to support the diversity of projects and companies which have, until recently, been the hallmark of program effectiveness.

In my judgment, it is likely that the problem of non-availability of Demonstration Funding -- the second 'D' in the innovation process after Research & 'D'evelopment -- which was a (the) major trigger for BIO in their effort to try to capture the SBIR program.


Many of you are experiencing precisely the same issues that your technology is frequently not ready for prime time at the end of Phase II (or multiples of). This is an issue of consequence that should/must be part of the reauthorization effort.

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http://www.inknowvation.com/Call_To_Action_SBIR_2008/

Time to step up:
Most of you to whom this mail is directed - the long-time involved, bigger SBIR winners - already know that the authorization legislation for this very important technology and business development program will run out on September 30, 2008. More recently a few may also have become aware that, for the past three years or so, the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) and National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) have been seriously - and with increasing success - campaigning among Members in both the House and the Senate to achieve profound and far-reaching changes in SBIR eligibility to enable full program involvement by a much broader cross-section of VC funded firms.

A deceptively simple and compelling argument was (and is) being made to that end -- carefully peddled through an orchestrated media effort and lots of personal interaction with key Members -- that early-stage biotech research firms are being arbitrarily shut out of effective SBIR participation in NIH.

The fact that their story does not stand up well to scrutiny and carefully disguises what is actually happening has not been discussed.  Between the fact


BIO-NVCA has been in almost complete control of the SBIR reauthoization discussion to date and, unless there is effective counter-argument heard, will almost certainly determine what the next generation of SBIR will look like.

Let it be very clear: this very well-crafted, and even better-funded effort could radically change the structure and direction of the SBIR program in all the larger agencies.  This is not an NIH specific concern as many apparently think.  Unquestionably the BIO-NVCA sustained campaign has already seriously impeded the effort to get to reauthorization early in this Congress so as to avoid the debacle of 2000 when, as you will recall, the enabling legislation ran out and when some very creative efforts were required to keep things functional until the required passage was finally achieved in the closing minutes of that Congress.

With few Members this time having heard any opposing arguments and, with all due respect, a largely intermittent debate in which the agenda has always been that set by BIO-NVCA, by this Spring they had convinced many in the Congress and in the media of the rightness of their cause.  They had achieved a very powerful position from which to enable their capture of SBIR almost entirely only for firms which fit the VC profile - firms addressing very large markets and the prospect of a near-term liquidity event.

The culmination of this carefully crafted effort was the achievement on April 23, 2008 of an overwhelming majority in the House for H.R. 5819 - a bill that, if replicated in the Senate, would radically change what SBIR is about and will almost certainly affect you.

Money talks:
The major financial commitments and other resources on which BIO-NVCA have been able to draw down - estimated at well in excess of $10-12M to date - has been a hugely important factor in what they have accomplished.  As has always been the case through the years, those carrying the SBIR flag in the political space have been almost invariably doing what they could on a wing and a prayer.

This situation cannot be allowed to stand!  There has to be financial commitment from within the community to support the major efforts now underway to counter what BIO-NVCA have achieved.

It is entirely understandable that younger and smaller firms somehow think that the SBIR political effort "just happens" and/or that someone else is paying for what needs to be done.  As bigger winners, you (should) know better.

 https://www.inknowvation.com/Call_To_Action_SBIR_2008/Contribute.html

If you've already contributed to the Small Business Technology Council, that's great!  For a long time, SBTC has been almost the only dissenting voice and they continue to fight for SBIR and on your behalf.  They need and deserve your support,

Given the tools we have to hand, we're coming at things quite differently - the same basic thrust but with a different slant and presentation.  But my information is that SBTC is having the same experience that we are - an almost complete unwillingness by the SBIR Community to contribute into support of the effort and an almost naive understanding of what is involved to have any real impact on this serious situation.

In our case, hundreds of awardees have been responding to our Call to Action emails to over 6500 current SBIR awardees informing  them - clearly for most for the very first time - that SBIR is in trouble.  They have been


We know that hundreds of firms who have never previously spoken up have been making very effective Member contact -


We have copies of the emails they are sending and receiving back and accounts of the calls and the visits.  We know that


In short, a useful and appropriate campaign is now underway - tentative but working .... and beginning to make a difference.

Yet - with only rare exception - when asked it if they are willing to contribute to the cause, the answer is a total non-response or a resounding no. As so often before, we are covering the cost out of personal and company resources.

When the wheels fell off:
Like many of you, not until late March 2008 did I become aware that the wheels had almost completely fallen off the SBIR Reauthorization effort; that the future of SBIR as a diverse program supporting all types of firms from start-up through mature, and across every field of technology endeavor was in serious trouble.

As many of you may know, I have been on the SBIR political front-line from the very earliest days - having helped to craft the original SBIR legislative effort - and have been part of every political engagement since to include reauthorization (in 1986 and 1992) and a range of efforts in particular agencies and elsewhere to to undermine the program.

In part because this type of effort is so extraordinarily demanding of time and resources - and almost always on our own nickle - I had pulled back in recent years.  This time, however, with the challenge so profound and the very future of SBIR in jeopardy, I have had to get back into the fray.

Our very powerful and comprehensive databases, developed and managed entirely with this company's funds, put us in the perhaps unique position of being able


There is a strong personal commitment here to the importance and value of the SBIR program.  At a time of economic stress, perhaps never more that now does this country needs what the SBIR community can do.  We will stay the course - but we should not be being expected to do this alone
 
--
Ann Eskesen
Innovation Development Institute
45 Beach Bluff Avenue Suite 300
Swampscott,   MA 01907-1542
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Voice:  (781) 595-2920
Fax:     (781) 593-4660
Email:  ann.eskesen@inknowvation.com
Web:    http://www.inknowvation.com