Backyard Brains Receives Prestigious Tibbetts Award 2020 for “Demonstrating Significant Economic and Social Impact”

Another accolade is about to hit our shelves! The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) recently announced recipients of the prestigious Tibbetts Award 2020. Backyard Brains is one of 38 companies that are deemed “beacons of promise and models of excellence in high technology.” Every year, Tibbie goes to companies, individuals and organizations “for the exceptional successes they achieved through SBA’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)” program.

This recognition further fuels our mission to keep building low-fi yet research-grade neuroscience gear and bringing it into your average school classroom. The goal is to help kids dip their toes into project-based science today so that they could help cure billions of people from neurological disorders tomorrow. That’s exactly what Tibbie is all about: a mix of “economic and social impact,” of research and development to propel young companies and help them serve our communities better.

Tibbie is named after Rolland Tibbetts, a senior program officer at the National Science Foundation who founded the SBIR/STTR federal funding program for small innovative companies. Backyard Brains was and still is one of these companies. And we wouldn’t have gotten very far without the support from farsighted federal grant programs for ideas that need time to blossom into successful commercial projects.

Today, we are joining the hall of fame of hundreds of companies and organizations who have been awarded Tibbie since its inception in 1995. Indeed, some multinational giants have kicked off their journey with Tibbie, including Qualcomm, 23andMe, Symantec and Broadcom. Here’s to hoping that we’ll grow at least half as big within the next decade!