I think that many people forget that one can start a company without being a “start up”. Foray people, success doesn’t always mean raising a ton of VC funding a

I think that many people forget that one can start a company without being a “start up”. Foray people, success doesn’t always mean raising a ton of VC funding and aiming for a huge valuation. I started my company over 18 years ago. We have a lot of fun doing really interesting work for interesting customers. We’re now a “commercial” company funding ourselves through commercial sales. However before we reached that point we had a few SBIR grants as well as some other US govt grants. Total was about 4M. I’d say that was helpful and valuable especially during the recession. Ironically we’ve sold more product to non-US governments than US. We try to only apply to grants that are 95% focused on what we want to do anyway. We’ve also found that applying to grants we find out about from public solicitations is not worth the effort. To win these grants one needs to find a sponsor interested in your technology, then get them to write a solicitation that is focused on your unique sauce. It doesn’t gaurentee you winning the grant but does increase the chances of your being considered. I am a little jaded on this topic. I feel that my team has really leveraged these findings into real products and, in turn, jobs. However I see TONS of companies that just charge through grants and never do anything greater with the funding. As a small business owner and tax payer (funder of these grants) that is not what I think is an ideal use of the money.