Hickenlooper Celebrates Senate Passage of Bill Funding Small Business Innovation, Growth

Hickenlooper voted yes to advance the bill
WASHINGTON –
Today, U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper voted to advance the bipartisan
Small Business Innovation and Economic Security Act
to reauthorize the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. The legislation now moves to the House of Representatives for consideration.
“Colorado’s small businesses and researchers drive American innovation,”
said Hickenlooper, a member of the Senate Committee on Small Business & Entrepreneurship and a former small business owner.
“These small businesses need funding to turn their really big ideas into jobs, technologies, and economic growth.”
The SBIR/STTR programs are essential to innovation, with the more than $77 billion in awards to 33,000 small businesses spurring life-changing inventions like the world’s smallest heart pump, GPS, and breakthroughs in treating diseases such as cancer and Alzheimer’s.
The
bill
would:
Reauthorize the SBIR and STTR program for five years.
Reject lifetime caps and preserve merit-based competition in the SBIR and STTR programs.
Protect the STTR program and research institutions’ ability to participate.
Ensure all SBIR funding is retained and no funding is lost as a result of the programs’ lapse.
Maintain strong foreign due diligence requirements and requires transparency from agencies.
As a member of the Senate Committee on Small Business & Entrepreneurship, Hickenlooper fights for small businesses. He
introduced
legislation to strengthen capital access and economic development in rural, tribal, and other underserved communities in Colorado through the Community Development Financial Institution Fund.
He also
fought back
against the Trump admin’s reckless proposal to strip hundreds of millions in entrepreneurial development funding from the Small Business Administration.
Leaders in the small business innovation ecosystem across the country applauded the Senate passage of the bill.
“The Small Business Technology Council (SBTC) fully endorses the Small Business Innovation and Economic Security Act and urges Congress to speedily pass this legislation to restore authority to the SBIR and STTR programs.  We are grateful to Senator Markey for his leadership and commitment to restoring these vital small-business funding programs to ensure that America’s high-tech small businesses can continue to receive the funding they need to drive America’s innovative economy and maintain our technological advantage,”
said SBTC Executive Director Jere Glover.
“The SBIR and STTR programs have fueled American innovation for decades by investing in small businesses and research institutions across America with big ideas to advance the missions of our military and public safety agencies, to improve the nation’s health and environment, and create highly skilled jobs. This bipartisan legislation followed months of negotiations to ensure that the renewal of these investments included common sense reforms to protect our know-how from potential adversaries, keep their merit-based competitive principles, and broaden participation. Senator Markey has worked tirelessly with his colleagues in both parties to make sure what makes these programs successful are not undermined by arbitrary restrictions so we can build on their unsurpassed return on investment for taxpayers. SBIR and STTR are the envy of the world for a reason. They are back in business and that is good news for American innovation and economic competitiveness and will help foster the next generation of innovators,”
said DefendSBIR, a coalition of two dozen leading small business innovators.
“The reauthorization of these programs acknowledges that investing in small business research and development is investing in the future of American competitiveness and scientific leadership. This legislation delivers certainty and stability?to the thousands of American small businesses, startups, and university researchers who depend on SBIR/STTR funding to grow new businesses and enable the United States to innovate and compete globally,”
said Barbara R. Snyder, President of the Association of American Universities (AAU).
“For over forty years, the SBIR and STTR programs have served as America’s innovation engine, enabling small businesses to develop and commercialize new technologies. We thank the Small Business Committee for its tireless efforts to develop this compromise for reauthorization and get it over the finish line. Restarting these vital programs will support the creation of new businesses and jobs, attract private-sector investment, and promote American competitiveness in technology innovation,”
said Lynn Abramson, President of the Clean Energy Business Network.
“This reauthorization represents a strong bipartisan commitment to U.S. competitiveness and accelerating the development and scaling of critical technologies. The SBIR and STTR programs provide catalytic, non-dilutive capital that enables entrepreneurs to de-risk breakthrough innovations and validate government demand—complementing the more than $15 in venture capital leveraged for every federal dollar invested. Beyond ensuring the program’s continuity, we applaud the inclusion of provisions that provide a clear pathway to commercialization, consistency, and transparency for entrepreneurs applying for the program,”
said National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) President and CEO Bobby Franklin.
“We would like to thank Senator Markey for his persistence in advocating for provisions in the final bill regarding high impact training for SBIR teams using the proven I-Corps (TM) approach. The inclusion of this language through this bipartisan compromise will accelerate development and improve outcomes of the SBIR program,”
said Phil Weilerstein, President and CEO of VentureWell.
Full text of the bill is available
HERE
.
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