Stateless receives grant from National Science Foundation

BOULDER — Stateless Inc., a company that is making network functions that can be offered in an “as-a-service” model, received a $750,000 grant from the National Science Foundation.

The grant is a follow-up to a previous $225,000 grant the company received from the National Science Foundation.

“A lot of people don’t realize that the National Science Foundation doesn’t only fund academic research, they want to support research overall,” CEO Murad Kablan told BizWest.

SPONSORED CONTENT

People Powered: Preparing Longmont Businesses for Economic Success

Longmont Chamber and FNBO present People Powered on April 24, 2024, aiming to inform business owners about workforce development, housing, and transportation issues.

The first, smaller grant, went to early stage companies that had an idea and perhaps an early prototype. That grant was focused on developing the product, validating features, market development. Because Sateless received that grant, it automatically qualified for the Phase II grant. After competing for that, Stateless was deemed a recipient and will use its $750,000 to complete the development of its prototype, hire more engineers and begin attending industry conferences.

Stateless is a platform meant to harness the power of data center networks. Stateless increases the connectivity between networks, which provides more security, visibility and control for colocation providers managing tenant traffic and communications across multiple locations.

Kablan said that he has found applying for the grants his company has received to be a beneficial process: by writing out a proposal of his company, it has helped him focus on what the company is really developing. Unfortunately, he said, many startups don’t go for grants and opt for venture capital instead, even when they could qualify for a grant.

“A lot of companies don’t know about these grants,” he said. “There’s also a process to applying. Between applying and receiving our acceptance took 6 to 9 months, a lot of companies don’t have the bandwidth to wait. But for us, the process of creating the application was very good: we had to write a commercialization plan, a budget. Things we would need anyway in our business and that would help in fundraising.”

Kablan said while the company looked at other opportunities — the company has investors — it knew it had this grant out there.

“Our plan was to apply and wait on the side. We didn’t rely on it, but if it came it would be big money for free without giving equity. If it didn’t come, we would continue the plan. This added to capital, that’s how we look at it.”

While the National Science Foundation grant is focused on research and development for the company, Stateless also recently received an advanced industries award grant from the state of Colorado, said Rebecca Warren, director of marketing for Stateless. That $250,000 will be used for expanding the company’s market segment.