Call for Proposals – SPI Technogrants Program 2023 (Switzerland)

Technogrants can also serve the improvement and adaptation of technologies to extreme environments, or support new technological developments to be used in the field for polar or remote high-altitude research.

Financial Support

• The grants are destined to cover costs for up to 75’000.- CHF per successfully evaluated project. For this year (2023), the total budget allocated to SPI Technogrants will be capped at 150’000.- CHF. The grants can be used to complement the funding of initiatives supported by larger funding schemes (e.g. SNSF, EU, etc.).

Eligible Costs

• All costs related to the conception, development, field testing (especially in the extreme environments of polar or remote high-altitude regions in which it is supposed to operate), upgrading and adjusting of science support technologies in a broad sense.
• Travel and logistics costs for field testing purposes are also eligible. The SPI also considers the offset of carbon emissions as an eligible cost, if not an option offered by the institution of affiliation of the applicant.

Target Public

• The SPI Technogrants are complementary to the Polar Access Fund and SPI Exploratory Grants. Consequently, eligibility will be restricted to Swiss led developments of technologies relevant for research in polar regions (and other extreme environments in remote high-altitude regions). The grants are open from Master’s students to senior researchers based at a Swiss public research institution.
• Applications are submitted by a Principal Investigator (PI), which will be SPI’s contact person within his/her institution. In case of a submission by a Master’s student, the application has to be overseen by a supervisor.
• Private companies and start-ups are eligible to join the project as partners but should work within a project coordinated by a PI employed at a Swiss public research institution. SPI cannot support projects coordinated by private companies.

Geographic Focus

• The SPI Technogrants fund technology development relevant for polar science, the Arctic and Antarctic, according to the SPI’s high latitude focus.
• High-altitude research is an essential part of SPI and an important complementary area of interest to high latitude poles. Funding of technology developments for high-altitude research will concentrate on technologies contributing to comparative high-altitude studies in support of polar issues and on complex and expensive logistics for field-testing thereof in remote high-altitude areas.

Evaluation

• Eligible proposals submitted before the deadline will be evaluated by an independent scientific panel appointed by the SPI.
• The proposals will be evaluated based on the following criteria:
  • Technological novelty and potential (disruption)
  • Impact of the proposed technology on polar science (added value)
  • Impact of the requested funding on the development process
  • Feasibility of the project
  • Potential of the applicant(s)/consortium
• A particular attention will be paid on aspects of development of the technology within the project as opposed to the purchase/slight adaptation of existing instruments and technologies.

For more information, visit Swiss Polar Institute.