Events

Get Non-Dilutive Funding for Your Startup

This workshop (held on Zoom) will take you through all the steps necessary to successfully file a well-written SBIR/STTR grant application for the April 2025 NIH deadline and April-July 2025 NSF window. Taking the workshop, you will learn how to craft an appropriate research plan, obtain persuasive letters of support, develop an efficient budget, and anticipate reviewers’ comments. We will help you speed through the application instructions, saving you hours of time. Results from past attendees indicate that taking this course triples your chances of success. The workshop culminates in a submission clinic that will ensure your application is correctly filed.

One or more team members (up to three) from the company should be prepared to participate in every session. These will be working sessions. The course comprises eight working sessions including a pre-submission review of your Specific Aims page by our course instructors.

Apply to join the workshop

The deadline to join this workshop is Thursday, January 23.

The workshop fee is $600, refundable through January 31 (the day after the first session).

Be prepared to commit to 40 hours of work on your submission. Companies must be incorporated by the date of the first, or at the very latest, the second session.

Schedule

Thursdays, 9:30-11:00 AM Pacific time: 1 hour presentation, 30 min Q&A. (Order of topics subject to change)

Thurs. Jan. 30 Eligibility & the registration process (NIH & NSF)
Thurs. Feb. 6 Specific Aims page (NIH) & the NSF elevator pitch
Thurs. Feb. 13 Budget & justification NIH & NSF (including Phase 2).
Thurs. Feb. 20 NIH Specific Aims/NSF pitch interactive peer review with Kaspar
Thurs. Feb. 27 Research plan for NIH & NSF (including Phase 2)
Thurs. Mar. 6 Letters, bios, & other sections NIH & NSF. Also, intro to IP confidentiality
Thurs. Mar. 13 Preparing forms for NIH & NSF
Thurs. Mar. 20 Preparing forms & submitting your proposal to the NIH & the NSF

Topics

• Understanding the eligibility requirements of an SBIR grant
• Preparing to apply for an SBIR (company formation, registration at all required websites, identifying the best PI)
• Assembling all the necessary parts of the application (letters of support, sub-contract quotes and letters, facilities description, research plan, etc.)
• Strategies for designing your specific aims
• Budget strategies and restrictions
• Complete and convincing budget justifications
• Documentation required to use human samples, human subjects and vertebrate animals
• What makes a competitive proposal
• Common mistakes that applicants make
• Filling in forms and submission process
• Re-submission if your grant is not funded
• Phase II SBIR applications
• Searching for program announcements and finding non-dilutive funding opportunities

Personnel

The workshop is led by Shauna Farr-Jones, PhD, UCSF/QB3 grant writer.

Logistics are handled by Kaspar Mossman, PhD, Managing Director, QB3, who also leads the interactive Specific Aims page session.

Workshop Fee

General Admission: $600

About the Instructor

Shauna Farr-Jones, PhD, has a record of writing successful government grant and contract proposals on diverse life science topics, providing strategic input on both research and business plans. She has helped companies secure over $200 million in grant and contract funding from numerous government and philanthropic organizations, including NIH, DOD, NSF, DTRA, DARPA, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. For 20 years, she has consulted for life science companies and universities, identifying funding opportunities, preparing research plans, commercialization plans, technical reports, INDs, and NDAs. She is currently an Academic Coordinator at UCSF. Previously, she was Senior Writer at BioCentury Publications, where she analyzed and wrote about the biotechnology industry. She was a post-doctoral fellow at UCSF and has a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Tufts University.