Engage in the national innovation network with NSF

The National Science Foundation (NSF) supports people, discovery and innovation, and we encourage would-be and established tech entrepreneurs to participate in NSF’s innovation network. Learn how you can make contributions, develop skills, and get support to translate research into technology, work directly with industry or get funding for a deep technology startup.

• NSF Innovation Corps program (I-Corps) participants (typically graduate students, post-docs or professors) can learn how to make their technology concept into a product through customer discovery. If you have worked on an NSF grant in the last few years, you may be eligible for the National I-Corps Teams program. If you have not, we encourage you to apply to an I-Corps regional cohort — contact an I-Corps Node close to you.
  
• America’s Seed Fund powered by NSF awards $200 million annually to approximately 400 startups transforming scientific discovery into products and services with commercial and societal impact. Startups working across almost all areas of science and technology can receive up to $1.75 million to support research and development. NSF supports students and veterans to conduct research through supplemental awards to startups funded by NSF.
  
• Innovative Post-doctoral Entrepreneurial Research Fellowships (I-PERF) provides early-career STEM Ph.D. recipients from underrepresented minorities with paid opportunities for training, mentorship, entrepreneurial activities, and innovative research at NSF-funded startups.
  
• INTERN enables graduate students already supported on an NSF grant to pursue internship and training opportunities outside of academia and gain professional development experience.
  
• The National GEM Consortium (GEM) fellowships help underrepresented minorities pursue their master’s or doctoral degrees in STEM-related fields. GEM has a cooperative partnership with NSF to support and encourage diverse researchers along entrepreneurial pathways through the I-Corps National Innovation Network.

To stay engaged, sign up for updates from NSF’s Division of Industrial Innovation and Partnerships.