(1) An application for a research and commercialization grant or loan must contain a written executive summary and project proposal.   The application must be submitted to the board's staff.   The executive summary must contain the following items:

(a) a summary of the proposed project, including a description of any new products or processes that might be developed and the technology involved;

(b) an explanation of how the project meets each of the statutory project criteria set forth in 90-3-1003(6) (a) through (i) , MCA;

(c) a brief discussion of whether the project enhances production agriculture;

(d) a description of whether the grant or loan is to be used for basic research, applied research or some combination of both;

(e) a discussion of the feasibility and/or availability of matching funds;

(f) an estimate of the total financing needs;

(g) the amount of funds requested from the board, with a description of the expected use of proceeds; and

(h) an indication of whether or not an external peer review has been conducted.

(2) The executive summary should not contain any information that the applicant does not want subject to public inspection, subject to constitutional limitations and determination by the department as to whether the information is proprietary.

(3) The research and commercialization project proposal must contain the following items:

(a) a title page;

(b) a table of contents;

(c) a project description containing the following items:

(i) the proposal objectives;

(ii) a background review of the technology;

(iii) the project design;

(iv) the results of external peer review if any;

(v) a list of required facilities and equipment;

(vi) a list of performance benchmarks with target dates;

(vii) an itemized budget and use of proceeds, with documentation showing source of funds and use of proceeds for each line of the budget; and

(viii) the resumes of the major principals identified in the project design describing the education and employment experience of each.

(d) a commercialization plan that includes a product description, a description of the targeted market including its size, marketing the product, product pricing considerations, a manufacturing or production plan and a business risk assessment.