House Small Business Committee Chairman Roger Williams has introduced legislation to reauthorize the SBIR/STTR program, titled the INNOVATE Act.  This bill largely mirrors the INNOVATE Act introduced by Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee Chairwoman Joni Ernst last March, and represents a major overhaul of the SBIR/STTR programs.

Some of the major changes in the INNOVATE Act include reducing the STTR set aside from 0.45% to 0.2%, while repurposing that money for jumbo Phase III type awards called “strategic breakthrough”.  It would create a pre-Phase I program called Phase IA, which gives awards up to $40,000 to firms new to the program.   The bill also limits principal investigators from working on more than one Phase I or II proposal at a time.  It also formalizes and makes more stringent the foreign risk section, prohibiting awards if it is determined that the firm has a foreign risk connected to any “subsidiaries, spinouts, and affiliates” for a 10 year period.  The bill would also only reauthorize the SBIR/STTR programs for 3 years.

The INNOVATE Act is particularly punitive towards multiple award winners, putting hard caps on annual revenue, number of Phase II awards, and total SBIR award dollars won.  SBTC is concerned that these provisions would harm the SBIR/STTR programs by depriving agencies of the innovations these companies provide, while also putting a cap on small business success.  Follow the link below to view the bill:

The Small Business Technology Council has endorsed the SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2025, introduced by Senator Markey and Representative Velazquez.  We believe that this bill would double down on the success of the SBIR/STTR programs by substantially increasing the set-aside for the first time since 2011.  It would also help companies in rural and underserved areas compete in the SBIR/STTR programs by reauthorizing and strengthening the Federal and State Technology (FAST) Partnership Program.  Perhaps most importantly, it would make the programs permanent, removing the need for Congress to reauthorize the programs every few years.