What do you mean? SBIR grants are intended to support early stage innovation projects. They should be able to be commercialized, but too high risk for normal investors. That's not really the same thing as a moon shot program. And individual federal agencies that participate in the program can decide what they are interested in researching.
> That's not really the same thing as a moon shot program.
Matthew Weinberg, former Special Advisor to the SBA's Office of Investment and Innovation, disagrees with you. With respect to the SBIR program, he said:
"It’s fundamentally astounding that the federal government—not private venture capital firms or banks—is the entity backing these moonshot investments that end up changing the world[1]."
He also wrote an article about the SBIC and SBIR programs entitled, "Your federal government drives innovation by investing in moonshots[2]".
"but too high risk for normal investors." what brings it pretty close to "moon shot", doesn't it?
"And individual federal agencies that participate in the program can decide what they are interested in researching."
This is true, I never said something different. I just know from people two who got SBIR I and II who discouraged me to apply since they know how the selections process works.
