Pliant Labs
Customer-discovery experts for SBIR teams.
Across NIH, NSF, DOE, NASA, and beyond.
Clinicians, plant operators, utility execs, ex-program managers, ex-FDA reviewers — the personas your I-Corps cohort actually needs to interview. Sourced from a network of 60,000+ federally-funded researchers and industry experts in 14 days, not 7 weeks.
Send us your award abstract. We'll send back 10 anonymized expert profiles — the people we'd source for your customer discovery. No credit card. 24-48 hour turnaround.
The bottleneck isn't synthesis. It's sourcing.
Your I-Corps cohort hands you 100 interviews to do in 7 weeks. Generic panels don't have practicing clinicians, ex-FDA reviewers, utility VPs, plant operators, ex-CMS medical directors, or retired federal program officers.
So you spend three weeks LinkedIn-searching, two weeks emailing alumni networks, and finish the cohort with 28 interviews — half of them off-persona.
We source the right experts in 48 hours. You spend your time on the conversation and the synthesis, not on the chase.
How an engagement works
Step 1
You send the abstract
Email us your SBIR/STTR award abstract. We send back 10 anonymized expert profiles tailored to your tech within 24-48 hours.
Step 2
We source and brief
You pick the personas. We handle scheduling, NDAs, and a pre-call brief for each expert.
Step 3
You run the interviews
You do the conversations. We optionally synthesize transcripts into a one-pager mapped to your commercialization plan.
Pricing scoped per engagement. Fits inside your TABA budget at most agencies.
Or, just want the list?
If you'd rather handle outreach yourself, we can deliver a contact list — names, affiliations, recent publications, and email addresses — and you take it from there. Lower cost, faster, and you own the relationship from first email.
60,000+ experts in the database — and growing every week.
Our network is built from federally-funded principal investigators, active clinical-trial PIs, past SBIR Phase II alumni, federal program officers, retired regulators, and industry KOLs.
Where our network runs deepest
Life sciences
Oncology, neurology, cardiology, infectious disease, diabetes, rare disease, gene/cell therapy. 60,000+ NIH-funded PIs and active trial investigators.
Energy and grid (DOE)
Utility executives, national-lab researchers, FERC alumni. Sourced per engagement.
Aerospace and dual-use (NASA)
Prime contractor tech scouts, ex-program managers. Sourced per engagement.
Hardware and deep tech (NSF)
Industrial buyers, manufacturing executives, university tech-transfer leads. Sourced per engagement.
Agriculture and food (USDA)
Agribusiness leaders, regulators. Sourced per engagement.
Any other SBIR vertical
Tell us your award topic. We'll send a sourcing plan within 48 hours.
Hard-to-reach personas — FDA reviewers, ex-CMS medical directors, ex-program managers, prime contractor tech scouts, retired SES — sourced individually per engagement. For niche needs, expect 5-10 business days.
Built to fit inside your award
Pliant Labs is available as a TABA provider on any SBIR/STTR award. April 2026's TABA reform removed vendor lock-in — you no longer need agency-roster approval to use us.
What we provide for your proposal:
- → Letter of commitment, on request
- → Sample budget justification language for your Project Narrative
- → W-9, EIN, and SAM.gov-ready paperwork
- → Invoicing aligned with your award milestones
Phase I awards include up to $6,500 of TABA. Phase II awards include up to $50,000. Both are additive at most agencies — you don't trade off R&D budget to use us.
Built for SBIR teams, by people who've watched the cohort clock run out.
Pliant Labs was founded by Damon McLean. After working alongside SBIR teams burning through grant deadlines failing to source the experts they needed, the gap was obvious — every adjacent tool (course management, synthesis software, AI meeting capture) addressed the easier problems while leaving the hardest one untouched.
Pliant Labs does one thing: source the experts. Think GLG, Tegus, or Guidepoint — but built for SBIR/STTR awardees across every agency.
See what we'd source for your tech.
Send us your SBIR award abstract. Within 24-48 hours we'll send back 10 expert profiles — the people we'd source for your customer-discovery work. Anonymized at first. Fully revealed when you sign.