If we just write them a check, they'll do whatever they want with it. They need to be held accountable, and ownership percentage is a way to do that. You could

If we just write them a check, they'll do whatever they want with it. They need to be held accountable, and ownership percentage is a way to do that. You could also just consider the grants to be loans that never need to be paid back as long as some set of concrete requirements is met by the company.