Thank you for the excellent suggestions! I've been working on bigger DoD contracts at my current job, so I'm pretty oblivious to the small company/university grant process.
Since I'm entering Stanford with the intent to obtain a terminal Master's, I'm not sure how much research I'll be allowed or encouraged to participate in. Continuing for my Doctorate is certainly still an option, but I think I'm leaning towards getting my Master's and finding/founding some small company to work with.
Any other insight you have into my situation would be appreciated!
If you don't want to do pure research for more than a few years, don't bother with a PhD. Building real things is more valuable. If you happen to be researching something very related to the real world, like some farm robot or robo soccer, you can trust a PhD will demand enough practical and operational skills to be useful even if you don't continue doing research.
Big defense projects are very, very different than SBIRs and STTRs.
Most importantly: you don't need permission to do cool work. It would be better to add a semester and do research than to just do coursework. I can't stress this enough.
Since I'm entering Stanford with the intent to obtain a terminal Master's, I'm not sure how much research I'll be allowed or encouraged to participate in. Continuing for my Doctorate is certainly still an option, but I think I'm leaning towards getting my Master's and finding/founding some small company to work with.
Any other insight you have into my situation would be appreciated!