Georgia TECH Research Corp

Georgia TECH Research Corp, doing business as the Office of Sponsored Programs, is the primary research entity of the Georgia Institute of Technology and operates as a tax-exempt nonprofit executing federal research contracts and grants across defense, civilian, and space agencies. The vendor acts as a prime recipient on the vast majority of its awards (93% of recent activity) and competes in full-and-open, non-set-aside categories, bringing specialized expertise in advanced research across scientific and engineering domains including materials science, photonics, biomedical engineering, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies, and applied physics.

The vendor's federal footprint is broad and deep. Recent awards span 235 distinct customer agencies, with the top five by award count—the National Science Foundation (2,131 awards), the Department of the Army (1,336), the Department of the Air Force (929), NASA (592), and the Department of the Navy (407)—accounting for 53% of recent activity. By potential value, the top customers diverge somewhat: NASA leads with $185.1 million in combined potential value, followed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA, $183.3 million), the Office of Naval Research ($49.6 million), Army Materiel Command Research Development and Engineering Command ($27.9 million), and Air Force Materiel Command Research Laboratory ($19.4 million). The vendor's customer concentration reflects its dual civilian-defense research portfolio, with particular strength in basic research, applied research, and exploratory development across physical sciences, engineering, and life sciences. Recent representative prime awards include a $10.6 million DARPA Other Transaction Agreement for mechanically amplified ferroic actuated logic (MEFA Logic), a $12.1 million NIH OTA for the H-VIPER hospital vulnerability assessment program, an $868,900 Office of Naval Research definitive contract for reconfigurable energy-selective surface development, a $1.45 million Navy contract for dynamic testing of reinforcement in expeditionary combat support systems, and a $1 million NSF Cooperative Agreement to establish the Programmable Cloud Laboratories-AI for Manufacturing and Materials Pilot Facility Node (PCL-AIMMPF) integrating Georgia Tech's Advanced Manufacturing Pilot Facility with cloud laboratory infrastructure.

The vendor holds seats on five high-activity parent vehicles: Basic Ordering Agreement DAAH0187D0082 (86 task orders), Indefinite Delivery Contracts DAAH0189D0133 and DAAH0192DR007 (64 each), DAKF1191D0004 (63), and DAKF1197D0001 (58). These are predominantly Army indefinite delivery vehicles supporting research and engineering services across multiple program areas. The vendor's activity has grown from 386 awards in 2023 to 530 in 2024, then moderated to 399 in 2025 and 218 in 2026; 460 awards carrying combined potential value of $82.2 million will reach completion within the next twenty-four months, creating recompete exposure across defense research, space science, and civilian agency portfolios.

Federal grant work is substantial and diversified. The vendor serves as prime recipient on grants from the National Science Foundation (including CAREER awards in machine learning, control systems, materials science, and quantum technologies), the National Institutes of Health (including awards from NAID, NIBIB, NHLBI, NCI, and NIGMS for biomedical research), NASA, the Department of Energy, ARPA-E, NSF-sponsored AI institutes, NSF Technology Innovation and Partnerships awards, and the Office of Naval Research. Recent examples include a $1 million NSF Cooperative Agreement for the AI Institute for Advances in Optimization (AI4OPT), a $5 million Cooperative Agreement for the PCL-AIMMPF test bed, a $2.596 million NIMH grant for multiscale models of multi-animal social interactions, a $725,241 NIH award for controlled-delivery HIV vaccine candidates, and a $750,000 NSF award to develop the NEAT (Next-Gen Engineering Education with AI Tutoring) framework. Grant recipients typically operate through Georgia TECH Research Corp's Office of Sponsored Programs administrative structure and frequently engage institutional sub-recipients from peer universities including Emory University, University of Florida, UC Irvine, University of Illinois, Carnegie Mellon, and others for collaborative research components.

SCI-reportable service contract data shows modest federal services invoicing ($2.4 million cumulative across FY2022–2025), with FY2022 as the highest ($1.4 million across 3.0 FTEs), FY2024 at $637 thousand (8.3 FTEs), and FY2025 at $402 thousand (4.9 FTEs); this reflects Georgia Tech's research-grant-dominated business model rather than service delivery. Median government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable prime contracts run around $62/hr, with the 90th percentile reaching $492/hr, reflecting a mix of technical and professional labor. The vendor performs the vast majority of work with its own labor; the SCI dataset shows negligible sub-hour engagement on prime contracts, indicating Georgia TECH Research Corp builds and operates its own research teams rather than relying on subcontractor labor to deliver federal research.

The vendor's corporate structure includes a named subsidiary, Georgia TECH Applied Research Corp, also registered as a nonprofit educational institution. The parent relationship to the Georgia Institute of Technology and its status as the official research contracting entity for Georgia Tech position the vendor as the central gateway through which the university executes federal research awards across all customer agencies. Activity is concentrated in applied research, exploratory development, and basic research; NAICS and PSC coding reflects this, with top categories spanning R&D in physical, engineering, and life sciences, R&D in defense systems and space science, and engineering services. The vendor competes in full-and-open categories without small-business set-asides, leveraging Georgia Tech's institutional reputation, researcher credentials, and research infrastructure to win awards on scientific merit and technical approach.