When was NIH SBIR/STTR founded?

NIH SBIR/STTR was founded in 1887.

Where is NIH SBIR/STTR's headquarters located?

NIH SBIR/STTR's headquarters is located in Bethesda (United States).

How many companies has NIH SBIR/STTR invested in?

NIH SBIR/STTR has invested in 81 companies, including Loft Orbital & Cytel.

Which companies has NIH SBIR/STTR invested in lately?

Zyl Therapeutics & Fluent BioSciences are the latest investments by NIH SBIR/STTR.

How many exits has NIH SBIR/STTR been involved in?

NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio has seen 3 IPOs and 19 acquisitions.

How many unicorns are there in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio?

There is 1 unicorn in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio.

NIH SBIR/STTR - 2026 Investor Profile, Portfolio, Team & Investment Trends

NIH SBIR/STTR, an accelerator and incubator program founded in 1887, is based in Bethesda, United States. With a presence in 3 countries, it has supported around 81 startups in sectors like Life Sciences, High Tech. As of Apr 2026, NIH SBIR/STTR has 1 unicorn under its belt and has witnessed 22 portfolio exits. Most notable companies in its portfolio include Loft Orbital, Cytel and Elsevier. The program is backed by a team of 2 people who primarily support Grant (prize money) startups based in United States. Its latest investment was a $263K Grant (prize money) round in Zyl Therapeutics on Sep 16, 2022.

Key Metrics

Founded Year

1887

Location

Bethesda, United States

Portfolio Companies

Loft Orbital, Cytel & 79 more

Sectors of Investment

Life Sciences, High Tech & 10 more

Stages of Investment

Grant (prize money), Series A & 1 more

Locations of Investment

United States, United Kingdom & 1 more

Unicorn in Portfolio

Loft Orbital

View NIH SBIR/STTR's full profile

NIH SBIR/STTR has a portfolio of 81 companies, one of which is a Unicorn. Their most notable investments include Loft Orbital and Cytel.Their portfolio spans across United States, United Kingdom and Netherlands. They have invested in Life Sciences, High Tech, Enterprise Applications and 9 other sectors, across stages such as Grant (prize money), Series A and 1 more. Here is the list of top investments by NIH SBIR/STTR:

1. Loft Orbital

Provider of space mission launch services. It offers microsatellite launching services. It includes platform manufacturing and integration, standard interfaces installation, launch booking and integration, regulatory compliance and licensing, and insurance. It also provides commissioning and routine operations through its global ground station partners. Its satellite operation dashboard enables payload tasking and access to data in near-real-time.

Key facts about Loft Orbital

Founded Year: 2016
Location: San Francisco (United States)
Stage: Series C
Total Funding till date: $330M
Employee Count: 189 as on Dec 31, 2024
Investors: BlackRock, Temasek and 36 Others
Latest Funding Round: Series C, Jan 15, 2025, $*****
Highlight: Editors' Pick

2. Cytel

Provider of data analysis and statistical solutions for the life sciences industry. It offers solutions for clinical trial design, analysis, and real world evidence, as well as data analytics and insights for the life sciences industry. It provides a range of software and services to support the drug development process. It includes solutions for clinical trial design, data analysis, and regulatory submissions.

Key facts about Cytel

Founded Year: 1987
Location: Cambridge (United States)
Stage: Acquired
Total Funding till date: $2M
Employee Count: 509 as on Sep 30, 2024
Investors: Autonomy Ventures, Merck and 3 Others
Latest Funding Round: Series A, Nov 01, 2017, $*****
Highlight: Acquired

3. Elsevier

Elsevier is a provider of information solutions to improve the performance of science, health, and technology professionals. The offered solutions include Scopus is the abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature: scientific journals, books and conference proceedings; ScienceDirect for researchers, teachers, students, healthcare, and information professionals to improve the way they search, discover, read, understand and share scholarly research; Mendeley is a free reference manager and academic social network that assist in research and collaboration with others; Evolve is a learning portal for healthcare educators and students to access online educational materials; Knovel helps engineers to solve complex problems by providing best practice insights, validated equations and materials and substances data.

Key facts about Elsevier

Founded Year: 1880
Location: Amsterdam (Netherlands)
Stage: Early Stage
Total Funding till date: $75K
Employee Count: 8,100 as on Dec 31, 2019
Investors: Silicon Alley Venture Partners, Housatonic and 5 Others
Latest Funding Round: Grant (prize money), Dec 21, 2021, $*****

4. Sirnaomics

Developer of RNA-based therapeutics for the treatment of cancer and fibrosis disease. The company has proprietary delivery technologies, a polypeptide nanoparticle RNAi platform and GalNAc RNAi platform, GalAhead, to develop drug candidate pipeline which include STP122G for cardiovascular disease treatment. It also, develops pipeline of drugs for cancers, skin conditions, fibrosis-related diseases, antiviral and cardiometabolic diseases, and medical aesthetics.

Key facts about Sirnaomics

Founded Year: 2007
Location: Gaithersburg (United States)
Stage: Public
Total Funding till date: $267M
Employee Count: 60 as on Jul 01, 2024
Investors: Rotating Boulder Fund, RiverHead Capital and 16 Others
Latest Funding Round: Post IPO, Sep 07, 2025, $*****
Highlight: Public

5. IotaMotion

Provider of a robotic system for cochlear implantation surgery. It offers implantable robotics and, electrode re-positioning, aiming to allow for enhanced natural hearing preservation and optimized hearing quality over time. It also provides an open platform and robotic-assisted system to control the speed and acceleration of electrode insertion during surgery.

Key facts about IotaMotion

Founded Year: 2015
Location: Coralville (United States)
Stage: Series B
Total Funding till date: $25M
Employee Count: 8 as on Jul 01, 2024
Investors: NIH, Next Level Ventures and 7 Others
Latest Funding Round: Series B, Jan 29, 2025, $*****
Highlight: Editors' Pick

View the full list of portfolio companies

NIH SBIR/STTR has invested in 81 companies over the last 32 years, with an average of 3 new investments annually in the last 10 years. Its most recent first time investment was in Zyl Therapeutics and most recent follow-on round was in Encodia.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's Year-on-Year Investment Trends:

Year	No. of Investments
Year	1^st Round	Follow-on	Total
2026 (YTD)	0	0	0
2025	0	0	0
2024	0	0	0
2023	0	0	0
2022	3	0	3
2021	4	0	4
2020	0	0	0
2019	5	0	5
2018	3	1	4
2017	3	0	3

View all investments by NIH SBIR/STTR

NIH SBIR/STTR has made 71 investments in Grant (prize money) stage with an average round size of $1.17M, 2 investments in Series A stage with an average round size of $2.5M and 1 investment in Angel stage with an average round size of $300K.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's investments by stage:

Stage of entry	No. of Investments
Grant (prize money)	71
Series A	2
Angel	1

Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments

View all investments by NIH SBIR/STTR

NIH SBIR/STTR has a diverse portfolio, with companies operating in the Life Sciences, High Tech, Enterprise Applications, HealthTech and Healthcare. Notably, it has invested in 70 Tech companies, 67 Enterprise (B2B) companies, 27 Software companies and at least 17 companies focusing on Tech hardware.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's investments by sector:

Sector	No. of Investments
Life Sciences	60
High Tech	21
Enterprise Applications	14
HealthTech	9
Healthcare	7
Others	16

Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments

View all investments by NIH SBIR/STTR

NIH SBIR/STTR has made most investments in United States (71), followed by United Kingdom where it has made 2 investments.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's investments by geography:

Country	No. of Investments
United States	71
United Kingdom	2
Netherlands	1

Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments

View all investments by NIH SBIR/STTR

NIH SBIR/STTR has not made any investment in 2026 so far.

Here are the most recent investments by NIH SBIR/STTR:

Filter this list

Date	Company	Location	Round Details	Round Amount	Co-Investors
Sep 16, 2022	Zyl Therapeutics	United States	Grant (prize money)	2928	-
Mar 10, 2022	Fluent BioSciences	United States	Grant (prize money)	3866	-
Mar 10, 2022	Inomagen	United States	Grant (prize money)	5980	-
Aug 26, 2021	Eclipse Regenesis	United States	Grant (prize money)	7747	-
May 28, 2021	miRecule	United States	Grant (prize money)	6796	-

See more recent investments made by NIH SBIR/STTR

NIH SBIR/STTR has 1 unicorn in its portfolio - Loft Orbital. The most recent unicorn in their portfolio is Loft Orbital which became a unicorn in 2025, 3 years after NIH SBIR/STTR first invested in it.

Here is a list of unicorns in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio:

Filter this list

Tracxn Score	Company	Short Description	Founded year	Sector	Location	Company Stage	First Investment/ Acquisition Details
68	Loft Orbital	Provider of space mission launch services	2016	Aerospace, Maritime and Defense Tech [+1]	San Francisco	Series C	lvkmwul

View more details about unicorns in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio

3 of NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio companies have become public. Sirnaomics got listed on the Hong Kong Exchanges (HKG), in Dec 2021 at marketcap of $821M and NexImmune got listed on the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ) at marketcap of $127M.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio companies that went public:

Filter this list

Company	IPO Date	First Invested on	First Round of Investment	Round Size
Sirnaomics	Dec 30, 2021	Jul 23, 2009	Grant (prize money)	9248
NexImmune	Feb 12, 2021	Jul 2013	Grant (prize money)	9700
BioForce Nanosciences	Oct 11, 2015	Jul 15, 2002	Grant (prize money)	3449

View more details about public companies in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio

19 companies from NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio have been acquired. The most recent acquisition was ISTO Biologics in Sep 2025 by Keensight Capital for $*****.

Here are NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio companies that got acquired most recently:

Filter this list

Company	Acquisition Date	First Invested on	First Round of Investment	Round Size
ISTO Biologics	Sep 17, 2025	Jul 29, 2015	Grant (prize money)	8964
Fluent BioSciences	Jul 09, 2024	Mar 10, 2022	Grant (prize money)	1401
SolveBio	Jan 24, 2023	Jun 07, 2016	Grant (prize money)	6131
Microbial Identification	Jan 04, 2023	-	-	6161
Materia	Sep 08, 2022	Oct 23, 2006	Grant (prize money)	4020

View all acquired companies in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio

NIH SBIR/STTR has a team of 2 members located in United States. NIH SBIR/STTR's team does not sit on the board of any company as of now.

View team details of NIH SBIR/STTR

Over the past 32 years, 197 investors have co-invested in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio companies. This includes funds and angels.

Invested before NIH SBIR/STTR: HHS, National Science Foundation and 76 others have invested in rounds before NIH SBIR/STTR. There are 37 companies where HHS has invested before NIH SBIR/STTR and 4 companies where National Science Foundation has invested before NIH SBIR/STTR.
Top Co-investors of NIH SBIR/STTR: 14 investors entered a company along with NIH SBIR/STTR. These include investors like National Science Foundation (2 companies).
Invested after NIH SBIR/STTR: A total of 105 investors have invested in NIH SBIR/STTR's portfolio after their investments. Top Investors include HHS (14 companies) and NIH (10 companies).