The New Jersey Commission on Science, Innovation and Technology announced Tuesday the creation of a $1.5 million Catalyst Seed Research and Development Grant Program to help New Jersey-based startups accelerate development of technologies.
CSIT officials said the funding will help the companies transform new discoveries from the research stage into commercially viable products and services. The application, which opens Dec. 6, will be available here.
CSIT will host an information webinar at 10 a.m. Dec. 7, which will include a walkthrough of the application. Register here.
The Catalyst Seed R&D Grant Program will be open to companies conducting R&D or testing technologies in the following areas that were identified as targeted industries:
- Advanced manufacturing;
- Transportation and logistics;
- Film and digital media;
- Life sciences (including, but not limited to, therapeutic drug development, diagnostics and medical devices);
- Nonretail food and beverage,;
- Finance and professional services;
- Technology.
“The new Catalyst Seed R&D Grant Program will vastly expand the scope of projects and companies that CSIT is able to support,” CSIT Executive Director Judith Sheft said. “Providing seed capital to businesses in high-wage, high-growth sectors is both beneficial to the individual entities and important to the strength of our overall innovation economy.”
The program will offer two grant components:
- Grants of up to $150,000 for projects that are developing life sciences therapeutics. It is anticipated that five awards will be made in this area;
- Grants of up to $75,000 for other innovation projects — non-life sciences therapeutic drug R&D projects and projects that are not eligible for the Clean Tech Seed Grant. It is anticipated that 10 awards will be made in this area.
Applicants for the Catalyst Seed R&D Grant Program will be required to demonstrate at least one of the following for their projects in order to be eligible for funding: description of the proof of concept results, published paper outlining results achieved, successful completion of a federal Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer grant or contract related to the project, and/or confirmation documentation from a university tech transfer office if the project relates to technology that has been developed at a university.
Complete eligibility requirements can be found here.
