9 small businesses chosen for new UNTHSC program to help land federal funding
Nine Tarrant County small businesses were chosen to receive funding in February as part of a new program from the University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth.
The Small Business and Innovation Research program of HSC Next, the innovation branch of the university, was created to help local small businesses get federal funds through what’s known as America’s Seed Fund.
Tarrant County provided UNTHSC a $2 million grant to fund the initiative back in December.
“This is one of the first programs like this that is funded by a municipality,” said Cameron Cushman, UNTHSC’s assistant vice president of innovation ecosystems. “It’s pretty forward-thinking of Tarrant County to fund something like this.”
Nine companies participated in the inaugural cohort of SBIR Phase 0 this past month: Articulate Labs, Entvantage Dx, Memsel, Neuro Rehab, PaRxVision, SecureFoundry, Sinclair Digital Services, TerraStor and VaxDome.
Each of the businesses must employ less than 500 people, present new innovations, work within U.S. borders, emphasize research and development with a plan to commercialize and be U.S.-owned and -operated to receive HSC funds, the university said.
“Tarrant County’s decision to fund an SBIR Phase 0 program is unprecedented,” said Dr. Adrian Denvir, the university’s director of SBIR Phase 0 programming. “The Tarrant County grant enables our team to engage in community outreach to increase awareness of Small Business and Innovation Research funding opportunities.”
The program will select a new cohort each month through November 2024, the university said. Members of the cohort meet weekly for a month and can receive follow-up assistance.
The Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs are federal initiatives to help small business owners receive funding to conduct research and development projects. SBIR provides about $3.7 billion annually to small businesses. It is the country’s largest single source of early-stage funding that does not require the business owner to give up equity in their company.
HSC Next will help mentor businesses through the process by assisting with market research, technology assessments and grant-writing assistance.
