notes-grants-sbir

check margins

make sure all latex files have header

CCR and DUNS are NOT req'd before submission, despite all the notices in Fastlane to the contrary. use 111111111 for EIR and DUNS.

make sure its letter (8.5x11) size paper -- if you render to A4, the latex header will give margins that are too small

latex doest respect margins absolutely; if you have a citation without a space after a word, it may go into the margin. URLs, even in the references, may go into the margin. doublecheck this

the Fastlane system doesnt check to make sure your documents arent too long when you paste them into the system in plaintext and it renders them for you. check this yourself.

the FAQ is incorrect in that it says that consultant letters count against some sort of length limit; they don't. biosketches for consultants do not have to be in the format in the GPG. senior personnel do.

the GPG is incorrect when it says you can't pay senior personnel for more than 2 months. this is only for other sorts of grants, not SBIRs.

you have to include the grant you're applying for in "current and pending sources of support"

the solicitation says you can have indirect costs up to 150%, but i've been told that that would be considered "outrageous" and that 40% "won't raise any eyebrows".

when you create your organizational login in fastlane, you will have to print something out, sign it, scan it, and email it to fastlane tech support. you dont get a login until they look at it. they are generally quick about looking at it, but do this early.

the time of the due date is your local time, but this is calculated as the timezone where the work will be performed (or is it your organization's address, i forgot?), so this may not be where you personally are sitting

they are superstrict about the due time, and won't even accept revisions after that on the same day to fix careless errors, so get it in early. they may accept revisions that fix the formatting. you can submit a revision in fastlane but they want you to call them.

consultants have to submit letters that confirms their availability and rate. append them to the budget justification.

software developed, patents, copyright may be substitued for publications in the biosketch.

i've been told to have some citations or the scientists will think you aren't an expert. you are supposed to be familar with the state of the art. i've been told to have some indirect costs or they'll think you're naive. but i've also been told that the reviewers dont see the budget for SBIRs, so i dont know which is correct.

i think you dont just get the money for indirect costs; you'll have to bill them for specific expenditures and justify them at that time.

it took me over 8 hrs just to figure out and handle details about the budget, formatting, and i had some questions that i had to ask them about, which sometimes took a few days.

it took me a few hours at the end to fix formatting mistakes (most of which are described above). and i've been involved with an NSF grant before

you can have multiple senior personnel, just not co-pis. they each need a biosketch.

just uploading everything to fastlane takes more than 10 mins. you can u/l it incrementally as you work on it. after the PI submits it, your AOR must login and approve it (if the PI is the AOR, they still have to login separately under "research administration"

check refs not ??, check ref/body match (check a high number)