Speaking as someone who's reviewed for NSF before, I'd have expected this grant to also include resources to get the product to market, which I'm assuming you haven't done.
Not on the battery relay, no, but I have done some small scale hardware projects (>10k units) , and for something like this I’d need about 250k to make 10k units of a <$10 BOM setup like this. Not sure what any relevant certificates might cost though. At any rate it’s not going to be good for your vehicle warranty lol.
But they might be funding for marketing costs and other soft expenses. Nice project and a great jaunt for a year or two. I’m sure they will learn a lot. Good for them.
The real screwy thing here is it’s like they did no market research or customer testing here. There are already a multitude of cheap, sophisticated, highly effective solutions in this segment that are much less user hostile than this gadget seems to be .
I don't think so. NSF Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) and NSF Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants include getting products to market. But this is a regular research grant from NSF Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC)[1].
The SaTC does have a Transition to Practice (TTP) option. However, this research is CORE (see the text "CORE" in the project title [2]). The objective is to write research papers.
Hmm. If the can figure out how to make it so I can’t just tear their device out and hook up my own battery cable they might be on to something, but most new cars already come with sophisticated anti tampering measures.
At any rate, good for them. It will be a great learning experience at least.
