Voucher Opportunity 4 (Recipients) - Commercialization Support (EERE)

Are you a company (for-profit entity) who received support from DOE through a prize competition or a research and development (R&D) financial assistance agreement/contract in the last 5 years? This opportunity is designed to provide additional support in the form of a voucher for help with market assessment, business plan formulation, fundraising road-mapping (from both public and private sources), and commercialization strategy. See below for additional info about eligibility and timeline.

As part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Technology Commercialization Fund, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Technology Transitions (OTT), and Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), in collaboration with ENERGYWERX, is offering its Commercialization Support Voucher Opportunity (VO-4) to eligible companies to increase adoption readiness (with a focus on value proposition and market acceptance) of clean energy technologies.

Note: In order to access the voucher provider list (the discussed .xlsx and .pdf files), you will need to successfully complete the eligibility form, which is part of your submission. Once the initial eligibility questions are successfully answered, you are permitted to access the actual application; and the .xlsx and .pdf files are located at the base of the application form. The eligibility/submission form can be found HERE.

The DOE Voucher Program builds bridges between U.S. entrepreneurs, businesses, technology developers or other relevant partners and third-party voucher providers to advance commercialization of innovative energy technologies. Voucher Opportunity (VO-4) includes market research, business plans, fundraising road-mapping (from both public and private sources), and other commercialization strategy assistance for companies who have received funding from DOE’s RD&D programs.

DOE has selected and pre-approved a cohort of voucher providers offering a variety of capabilities you might be interested into. For this voucher opportunity, capabilities include:

• Market Assessment
• Business Plan
• Fundraising
• General Commercialization Planning
• Planning
• Intellectual Property

When you apply, you will review the available capabilities and submit your preferences in the submittable form. If you find something that can be valuable to your company and that can enable your company accelerate demonstration, commercialization, and deployment of your product, please consider applying to receive that in kind support.

Voucher Projects: Expected max voucher worth $50,000 of work. Vouchers will be distributed as in-kind support, meaning that ENERGYWERX will directly reimburse the voucher provider for the work they have completed on behalf of the voucher recipients. Only work related to specific technology areas will be eligible to receive a voucher under this opportunity. List of eligible technology areas:

-   With EERE funding:

• Clean Hydrogen
• Industrial Decarbonization
• Advanced materials and Manufacturing Technologies
• Building efficiency
• Geothermal
• Solar
• Water
• Wind
• Bioenergy
• Vehicle technologies

DOE anticipates issuing approximately 35 vouchers at this time.

Voucher Recipients: Limited to for-profit companies who have won a prize or were prime recipients of a DOE financial assistance award (i.e. a grant or cooperative agreement) or prime contractors in other R&D contract active at any point after January 1^st, 2019, to develop a proof of concept or product prototype that fits a specific technology area of interest for DOE EERE. While the for-profit entity can have received previous R&D support from any DOE office (including but not limited to Office of Science, EERE, FECM, Nuclear Energy, ARPA-E, the SBIR/STTR office) only companies working on one of the eligible technology areas will be considered.

This opportunity is limited to one submission per requesting organization. In the case of multiple submissions, all submissions but the one with the latest time stamp will be disqualified.

Voucher Recipients: How to Participate in VO-4

1. Review the resources from the October 26, 2023 IW/OSS
2. Review resources from the November 9, 2023 Office Hours
3. Download the Voucher Recipient Needs Request: Click Here to Download
4. Complete the Submission Form and upload completed Voucher Recipient Needs Request: Click Here to Submit (Submissions are due No Later Than November 16, 2023, 5:00 PM ET)

In order to access the voucher provider list (the discussed .xlsx and .pdf files), you will need to successfully complete the eligibility form, which is part of your submission. Once the initial eligibility questions are successfully answered, you are permitted to access the actual application; and the .xlsx and .pdf files are located at the base of the application form. The eligibility/submission form can be found HERE.

Pending availability of funds, additional submission windows may open in the future for this voucher opportunity.

This is not the only voucher opportunity currently available through ENERGYWERX. See below for additional information related to other voucher opportunities:

• VO-1: Pre-Demonstration Commercialization Support (OCED/EERE)
  
• VO-2: Performance Validation, Modeling, and Certification Support (OCED/EERE)
  
• VO-3: Clean Energy Demonstration Project Siting/Permitting Support
  
• VO-5: Commercialization Support (Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management, FECM)