[kohanz]

My thoughts exactly. Also, depending on the location, there are typically a large amount of public funds earmarked as grants for commercialization in this field. It's not the typical tech-company fundraising situation either. The marketing needs are also vastly different from the companies you mentioned.

[Bikanta]

We are planning to pursue the SBIR grant route, but there is a lag time in the grant application process and we are eager to supplement our current developmental traction in the meantime with funds from other sources as well.

[ridgeguy]

SBIR grants can also be quite defocusing.

In a long-ago materials startup, we had 30+ Phase I, 6 Phase II and 3 Phase III SBIRs. The money was helpful (VC funding on topic was thin at the time).

Very few of our SBIRs were exactly on point with our product development goals. This created resource allocation tensions around pushing product development vs. performing on the SBIR contracts. Something to consider when thinking about SBIR funding.