The Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), Maria Contreras-Sweet announced during National Small Business Week 2015 that the SBA is crowdsourcing the official logo for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Programs, “America’s Seed Fund” and has made major improvements to the www.sbir.gov website.
The SBA oversees the SBIR and the STTR programs, America’s largest seed fund for small businesses in the STEM fields. These programs allocate $2.5 billion a year to small innovators. By reserving a specific percentage of federal R&D funds for smaller firms, this encourages domestic small businesses to engage in high-growth priorities and build a strong national economy.
In her keynote address at the eMerge conference in Miami Monday morning, Contreras-Sweet spoke about the improvements to the SBIR.gov website and new logo, “It’s a central portal with a treasure trove of information about how to apply for federal innovation awards. We have made the site much more sleek, accessible and easy to navigate – with fewer clicks to get you where you’re going. Additionally, we’re now accepting submissions for a crowd-funded competition to design a new SBIR logo. So if there are any artists or designers in the audience or watching the live stream, May 29 is the deadline to submit your entry.”
The competition will run pursuant to the America Competes Act, and encourages the amazingly creative community in the United States to create a thoughtful and imaginative visual representation of the government’s largest innovation effort focused on research-driven, innovative and cutting-edge small businesses. All details, rules, registration and submission instructions about the logo competition are available until May 29 at www.challenge.gov.
The winning submission will serve as the official logo for the programs and will be used for promotional and educational information, including but not limited to, SBA’s websites including www.sba.gov and www.sbir.gov, participating federal agency websites, conferences, events, television, print, and other traditional and digital media outlets. The winning logo will premiere at the 2015 Tibbetts Awards ceremony that will be held at the White House on June 15, 2015 and will also be highlighted at the National SBIR Conference with more than 3000 attendees that same week.
Each year since 1963, the President of the United States has issued a proclamation calling for the celebration of National Small Business Week. This year National Small Business Week will be recognized from May 4-8 with national events planned in Miami/Boca Raton, Los Angeles, San Antonio, New York and Washington, D.C.
Events throughout the week will be live-streamed on SBA’s website at www.sba.gov. Make sure to check in during the event for live social media engagement, using the hashtag #DreamSmallBiz. For more information on the national events please visit: www.sba.gov/smallbusinessweek.