Emtech Bio Seed Grant Program
Call for Proposals
Deadline: January 16, 2009

Program: The Emtech Bio Seed Grant program is a partnership between Emory and Georgia Tech. The grant program is offered through, and managed by Emtech Biotechnology Development, Inc. (Emtech Bio), a non-profit corporation. The annual contributions from Emory and Georgia Tech are used to support interdisciplinary, collaborative, and translational research or development projects. The overall goal of this program is to bridge the gaps between innovation and commercialization. A more specific objective and major focus, is to leverage the Georgia Research Alliance (GRA) VentureLab funding and the federal government’s small business research funding by creating startup projects suitable for these funding opportunities. It is desirable that Emtech-Bio-supported projects be further funded by additional programs like GRA/SBIR/STTR.

Eligibility: Proposed research must involve permanent, full-time faculty from both Emory and Georgia Tech. Investigators having existing intellectual property (IP) resulting from other types of research funding, are encouraged to apply for this grant to obtain proof-of-principle. The Emtech Bio Seed Grant program excludes BME faculty eligible for the Wallace H. Coulter Translational/Clinical Research Seed Grant program.

Research Thrusts: Translational research relating to development of potential therapeutics, diagnostics, medical devices, new materials, research tools, and software for medical application is the focus.

Criteria: The research must relate directly to translating product or service ideas to potential business opportunities. Evaluation of each proposal will be on the basis of scientific merit, proof- -of-principle focus, commercialization potential, and possibility of creating and/or improving intellectual property.

Information Sessions: Two information sessions will be held at Georgia Tech and Emory, respectively. Please RSVP to ott-web@emory.edu.

Georgia Tech: Monday, December 1, 2008, 11:00 a.m.; IBB Building Suddath Seminar Room (Room Number 1128), 315 Ferst Dr., Atlanta, GA 30332-0363; directions: http://www.ibb.gatech.edu/visitors/

Emory: Monday, December 1, 2008, 3:30 p.m.; Office of Technology Transfer, Room 4.259, 1599 Clifton Road, NE, 4th Floor, Atlanta, GA 30322; directions: http://www.destination.emory.edu/ott.html

Submission: Emtech Bio will accept electronic submission of proposals until 11:00 p.m. EST on the deadline date. Paper or email submission will not be accepted. The electronic submission system will be functional from December 29, 2008 until 11:00 p.m. on January 16, 2009.
The electronic submission system security protocol requires that the Emory University PI credentials be used to log into the system.
At the prompt, the Emory PI must enter their user name and password. Upon successful submission both the Emory and the Georgia Tech PI's will receive a confirmation email at their email addresses.

There is a five-page limit for the body of the proposal including charts, tables and illustrations. Please use 12-point font or larger. In addition, you must include a cover page, a budget page, and a two-page NIH format CV of each co-investigator. The cover page must contain the project title, names of the co-investigators, amount requested, and a one-paragraph abstract. A Sponsored Programs Approval Form (Emory SPAF) and a Proposal Routing Form (Georgia Tech) must be attached to the proposal.

The body of the proposal must include:

• Description of the unmet product or service opportunity
• Potential solutions based on previous discoveries, preliminary data, or proposed proof-of-principle studies
• Experimental design of the proposed proof-of-principle studies
• Goals, expected quarterly milestones and plans for achieving them
• Existing IP status and potential improvement; potential new IP
• List of current funding for each co-investigator (including dollar amount)
• If needed, approval status for animal and human subjects
• Plan for further funding after Emtech Bio award expires

Review Process: All qualifying proposals will go through a two-step review process, an initial scientific review by peer scientists followed by a comprehensive review by a six-member panel which includes two venture capitalists, two entrepreneurs or business executives, a physician scientist and a basic scientist. The panel will select candidates who will be asked to give presentations to the panel. Final selections will be announced in April, 2009.

Duration: Awards will be for a one-year period (July 1 through June 30). Requests for no-cost extensions must have a comparison of milestones achieved versus those planned in the original proposal. Requests for funding renewals will be evaluated on a competitive basis.

Budget: Awards will range from $75,000 to $100,000 for a one-year period. Investigators should submit a separate budget for Emory and Georgia Tech with both budgets on one page. Emtech Bio funds will be disbursed in two equal traunches in July and January with the second traunche of funding conditional upon milestones achieved during the first six months. Funds may be used for research and development expenses including salary and fringe benefit support of faculty, graduate students and other research staff, but may not be used for general staff or administrative support. Indirect costs of ten percent of direct costs must be included in the budget.

Reporting: Award recipients will be required to prepare and submit brief written quarterly progress reports, to make presentations at the mid-point of funding year prior to receiving the second traunche of funding, and to submit a final report. Reporting details will be specified in the research agreement between Emtech Bio and the grantee institution.

For questions, please contact: Kevin Lei (klei@emory.edu, 404-727-7241)

NOTES:
Use NIH Font size and spacing requirements described here: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/phs398/phs398.pdf

See Emory Proposal Processing at: http://www.osp.emory.edu/shared_web/forms.cfm#spaf

See Georgia Tech Proposal Process at: http://www.osp.gatech.edu/process.shtml

Back to top of page