The mission of the Rapid Reaction Technology Office (RRTO) is to deliver innovative, leap-ahead capabilities to the Joint Force through prototypes and experiments that accelerate, align, and evaluate Joint mission capabilities. RRTO’s strength is the ability to discover new ideas for emerging technologies and capabilities, turn them into executable programs, and accelerate capability to the warfighter.

The Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program was established by Congress in 1982 with a statutory purpose to strengthen the role of innovative small business concerns (SBCs) in Federally-funded research or research and development (R/R&D). Specific program purposes are to: (1) Stimulate technological innovation; (2) use small business to meet Federal R/R&D needs; (3) foster and encourage participation by socially and economically disadvantaged SBCs in working in technological innovation; and (4) increase private sector commercialization of innovations derived from Federal R/R&D, thereby increasing competition, productivity and economic growth.

The Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program is a sister program to SBIR, established by Congress in 1992 with a similar statutory purpose as SBIR. A major difference in the two programs is that the STTR requires the small business to have a research partner consisting of a University, Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC), or a qualified non-profit research institution. In STTR, the small business must be the prime contractor and perform at least 40% of the work, with the research partner performing at least 30% of the work. The balance can be done by either party and/or a third party.