Innovative Postdoctoral Entrepreneurial Research Fellowship (I-PERF)

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The broader impact of the proposed postdoctoral fellowship program will be an increase in the number of persons from underrepresented groups such as women, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, American Indians, and Hawaiian/Pacific Islanders and those with disabilities who perform small business research in support of the federal government and participate in technology development and entrepreneurship in the private sector. This program is aimed at defining a new career pathway for entrepreneurial-minded, underrepresented scholars. It is proposed that the policies, planned interactions with program managers, entrepreneurs and investors, professional development programming, and the overall opportunity provided will succeed in this effort where other efforts have come short. In addition, the program will actively engage underrepresented groups and innovative start-up and small business companies in geographically under-served states as defined by National Science Foundation (NSF) Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR).The proposed postdoctoral fellowship program will create new professional development opportunities for underrepresented fellows in qualified innovative start-up companies and small business that receive SBIR/STTR Phase II funding from NSF. On the long term, the program is expected to expand the participation of underrepresented innovators in the US innovation ecosystem, through the creation of new technology jobs and more start-up companies. In FY 2013, the last year data was available to the proposing team, the Small Business Administration (SBA) made 5,159 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I and Phase II awards totaling $2.1 billion. Only 236 or 4.57% awards were made to minority owned firms that year. For comparison, this outcome is lower than the percent and number of Science and Engineering (S&E) doctorates awarded to under-represented groups that year, 12.64% and 2,897 respectively, and does not reflect the capacity of the more than 130,000 underrepresented S&E doctorate degree holders in the U.S. workforce. A similar problem is found in the private sector. In 2016, venture capitalists invested $58.2 billion in 5,839 male-founded companies compared to just $1.46 billion in 359 female-founded companies; women represented 4.94% of the deal flow. The percentages are lower among minority business enterprises. The proposed postdoctoral fellowship program will directly address the aforementioned challenges at a time in the 21st century where the primacy of United States (US) innovation is facing unprecedented competitive pressure.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.