Grant will aid SC small businesses competing for federal research contracts

COLUMBIA — The federal government is tapping South Carolina’s state-run small business investor and incubator to help startups develop new technologies and land government contracts.

The U.S. Small Business Administration awarded the South Carolina Research Authority a $185,000 grant to recruit technology-focused entrepreneurs on behalf of the federal agency.

The program aims to reach entrepreneurs outside the country’s traditional technology hubs, increasing access to early-stage research and development funding.

“America’s economic and national security depends on our ability to continue to out-innovate, out-build, and out-compete every nation in the world,” Kelly Loeffler, administrator of the Small Business Administration, said in a statement.

The federal agency is “expanding America’s small businesses’ seat at the table in building the technologies and supply chains that are strengthening our industrial and economic future,” said Loeffler, a former GOP U.S. senator from Georgia. “These awards will help innovators across the country turn breakthrough ideas into American jobs, stronger communities, and the next generation of commercial and national-security leadership.”

Over the next year, the Research Authority will work alongside the state Department of Commerce to find companies and help them apply for seed funding under the recently reauthorized programs known as Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer, said Melissa Lindler, the federal agency’s director in South Carolina.

Under those programs, companies conduct research and development projects for the federal departments of agriculture, commerce, war, education, energy, health and human services, homeland security, interior, transportation, the Environmental Protection Agency, NASA, the National Science Foundation or the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

“Navigating the federal research and development marketplace can be challenging, especially for first-time applicants,” Lindler said told the SC Daily Gazette. The Research Authority’s “work will help bridge that gap.”

Grant amounts under the programs vary based on phase, length and agency, but generally range from $50,000 to a couple of million dollars.

Since 1984, South Carolina small businesses have received 880 such awards. That includes three last year and 22 in 2025.

For example, the National Science Foundation, in August, awarded $1.25 million to Handtech, a Simpsonville-based company, to develop artificial intelligence technology for the logging industry. The technology measures dimensions and defects in felled trees to grade each log’s quality.

In September 2025, the national scientific research agency awarded $1 million to Insectapel, a Greenville company developing a non-toxic insect repellent that can be sewn into outdoor clothing.

And in August 2025, the U.S. Department of Transportation awarded Columbia-based Insight Rail more than $200,000 to develop a 3-D imaging technology to inspect railroad tracks for buckling and breakage.

New to the program, which Congress and President Donald Trump reauthorized in April for five years through Sept. 30, 2031, is an increased focus on the defense industry, Lindler said.

Bill Kirkland, president of the South Carolina Research Authority, said the program is a natural fit for the state-created nonprofit he leads. It has an existing network of member startups. Companies can stack federal funding alongside state-level grants offered through the Research Authority’s own SC Launch program.

“This award helps more South Carolina entrepreneurs, in every part of the state, compete for federal research funding,” Kirkland said. “It grows our startup pipeline, strengthens SC Launch, and turns good ideas into companies and jobs here at home.”