Two of the agencies participating in a Small Business Administration innovation program opted to open the program to small businesses that are majority-owned by venture capital firms, says a Nov. 20 Government Accountability Office report.

The Health and Human Services Department and the Energy Department opted to open part of their Small Business Innovation Research programs to small businesses that are majority-owned by multiple venture capital or similar firms, allowing such companies to apply for and receive SBIR awards, the report says.

Specifically, HHS’s National Institutes of Health and the DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency allowed such companies to participate.

For fiscal 2013 and fiscal 2014, NIH and ARPA together received 20 applications from majority-owned portfolio companies and made 12 SBIR awards to them, totaling about $7.9 million, the report says.

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