Funding and Financing

There are three funding possibilities for joint projects with industry: Direct financing, national funding and international funding for co-operation.

Directly funded research co-operation

Companies can finance joint projects with ETH Zurich directly. This eliminates the need to submit applications to funding institutions and allows for a project start without delay.

What are the financial and legal requirements for co-operation with industry? More information is available here: Research contracts

Are there partners in industry for your research topic? Who should I contact? The ETH Industry Relations team will be happy to assist.

Nationally funded research co-operation

ETH Industry Relations.

Innosuisse supports preliminary studies (innovation cheques) and innovation projects with or without implementation partners from industry.

With the innovation cheque, Innosuisse supports preliminary studies with a credit voucher for the research partner (max. CHF 15,000.-). No personal contribution by the implementation partner is required. Only SMEs based in Switzerland are entitled to receive the voucher.

Science-based innovation projects between industry partners, private or public organisations and recognised research partners, which meet a clear market need and promise economic success or added value for society. Innosuisse bears the project costs of the research partners (maximum 50% of total project costs), the implementation partners contribute at least 50% to the implementation of the project (personal contribution). Innovation projects with implementation partners are neither limited in time nor financially, provided that the general conditions are met and the cost-benefit ratio is appropriate.

Research-driven innovation projects that have a high market potential but are not yet mature enough to involve an implementation partner or to create a start-up. Innosuisse finances 100% of the project costs (project duration maximum 18 months).

Beispiel f��r ein Innosuisse-Projekt (Video: ETH Z��rich)

Internationally funded research co-?operation

ETH Grants Office is part of the regionally structured Horizon Europe and external page Horizon 2020.

external page company advisors in the regions here.

For further European programmes, e.g. Eurostars and EU partnerships (Driving Urban Transitions - DUT, Personalised medicine �C PerMed, etc), please contact external page Innosuisse.

Researchers and companies can be supported in different ways and at different stages of their project:

As individual participant (so-called mono-beneficiary)
As member of a consortium with participants from industry and academia
In programmes with predefined topics (top-down) as well as in programmes with open topics (bottom-up)
With a focus on either early product development phases or phases bringing products to market maturity or towards expansion into new or larger market segments (scaling-up)