In a recent meeting with members of the Small Business Technology Council (SBTC), a top Department of Defense (DoD) official characterized the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program as DoD’s single most effective tool for delivering defense innovations.

Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology James Finley, who headed the roundtable discussion, has been quite open to recommendations from the small business research and development community. Having met with SBTC on several occasions, he acknowledges concerns voiced at the discussion about the sometimes rocky process for transitioning those SBIR technologies into mainstream DoD acquisition programs.

Finley and other Defense officials present, including Mike Caccuitto, who heads the SBIR Program at DoD, agreed that current technology transfer programs at the Pentagon have not been especially successful in delivering the full benefits of SBIR technologies to DoD. A number of possible improvements were discussed, including incentivizing large DoD prime contractors to insert SBIR technologies into major defense programs. SBTC members also encouraged the officials to strengthen the protection of small company intellectual property rights in situations where the IP needs to be shared with these major prime contractors.

As a follow-up to the meeting, SBTC will be revising its Defense White Paper to incorporate the points and recommendations made. The revised paper will be shared with DoD and Congress.