[Business]
On my continuing quest for knowledge in starting a small business, I have started looking into the Small Business Administrations site, which provides a wealth of useful information for Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) . They have items such as:

• Starting Business


• Financing Business


• Managing Business


• Business Oppoortunities

I have been investigating DOD SBIR solicitations for SBIR related efforts. This seems like a good oportunity for a variety of ventures.

I first identified some of the stages and limitations during working on said soliciations. The projects tends to be broken down into multi phases (I,II, and II) which basically has inital analysis/prototype, and moves more towards a deliverable usable comercial product. Each solicitation requires a minimum percentage of the work to be done by the small business. I guess this is to ensure that a larger business does not attempt to meet the soliciations, overwelming the small businesses. It still does allow subcontracting though.

In the process of reading some of Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program elements, I find it makes mention of what it takes to be considered a small business. This is a concern which is discussed on the SB Size page. With limited resources (personal, i.e. myself) at the moment, this may limit the types of solicitations that can be attempted but I definitly believe I would likely meet the requirements for a "small business", but need to confirm that.

There are time frames for solicitations. There is a pre-solicitation phase where those submitting submissions may opening discuss a specific solicitation with those sponsoring the solicitation, to allow additional details. However, after pre-solicitation phase, additional correspondance is possible through SBIR
Interactive Topic Information System (SITIS). It also includes a Quick Scan of currently active topics and correspondance relating to the given topic. This could prove a useful means of investigating topics as well.