Funding agencies and contract partners

Specific provisions apply with different funding agencies and contract partners.

SNF

All interactions in connection with funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation are handled via the external pagemySNF platform. If you have any questions, please contact the Grants Office of the Office of Research.

Innosuisse

Innosuisse finances application-oriented research projects, which companies carry out in cooperation with universities. Information about this is provided on the external pageInnosuisse website. The following documents are important

The Funding Agreement, which regulates the financing of Innosuisse for ETH Zurich, is signed by the responsible budget officer on behalf of ETH Zurich (without signature of VPR/VPKC of ETH Zurich).

The form “IPR Declaration", which Innosuisse usually asks from the project partners, is signed by the responsible budget officer on behalf of ETH Zurich (without signature VPR/VPKC of ETH Zurich).

Innosuisse usually requires an Agreement on intellectual property and use rights in projects with implementation partners. For ETH Zurich projects, the Research Contracts Group will be happy to prepare a draft for this agreement in consultation with the budget officer, based on its own templates. This agreement is to be signed on behalf of ETH Zurich by the responsible budget officer and by the VP for Knowledge Transfer and Corporate Relations. In any case, the Research Contracts Group must be involved in the negotiations as early as possible before signing.

Please note the DownloadInnosuisse regulations regarding independence of research and implementation partners (PDF, 226 KB).

In order to test the feasibility of a novel idea, an SME can apply for an external pageinnovation cheque worth up to CHF 15,000 from Innosuisse. A template for the contractual arrangement between the company and an ETH research group can be found in the download area.

Swiss Federal Offices

Many federal agencies, such as Swiss Federal Offices (BFE, BAFU, ASTRA, BAG, BLW, etc.) or other federal agencies such as the SDC conclude contracts with ETH Zurich on a project basis.

In the case of research projects supported by federal agencies at ETH Zurich, in which at least non-exclusive use of the results remains with ETH Zurich, ETH Zurich does not require a contribution to the indirect project costs (does not require an "overhead"). This is the case, for example, if the projects are carried out in accordance with the General Terms and Conditions of the Federal Government for Research Contracts (GTC research contracts).

If ETH Zurich renders a service for a federal agency, or if a research project is carried out under the terms and conditions for service contracts, without paragraph 11.1 being amended in such a way that non-exclusive rights of use to the property rights from the project remain with ETH Zurich, the corresponding surcharges of ETH Zurich shall apply.

EU

All projects funded by the European Commission, such as Horizon 2020, Horizon Europe or COST, are supported by EU GrantsAccess.

ESA

Applications, as well as contracts with ESA

The Research Contracts Group cooperates with the Space Innovation.

Space Innovation services to Swiss actors from research institutions, universities and industry for access to space missions or similar applications and to facilitate interactions between them. Space Innovation offers support in connection with ESA projects, mediates partners in the space sector and answers various questions, such as on external pageesa-star (ESA's electronic platform for tenders), external pageESA-P (ESA's electronic invoicing system) or the ESA-PSS forms. Further information can be found at external pagehttps://space-innovation.ch.

The Research Contracts Group supports ETH researchers in the contractual negotiations in connection with ESA projects, in particular concerning intellectual property issues. Please note:

ESA's General Terms and Conditions of Contract for the calls for tenders of ESA Contracts (GTC) require applicants to make a note in the application documents if they request changes to ESA's General Contractual Terms and Conditions for Contracts (GCC). The external pageGTC and GCC are available on the ESA website.

When submitting the application documents to ESA, the applicant and - if available - his subcontractors must provide the following information:

Possible reservations in connection with the regulation of intellectual property rights
Any changes to the General Terms and Conditions of Contract, as well as to ESA's proposal for a contract

ESA will not be able to accept any reservations subsequently made, or the corresponding invitation to call for tender will be invalidated. It is therefore important for the Research Contracts Group to be involved in discussions on the following aspects of the application documents at an early stage:

Contractual design of the project with partners and subcontractors
Aspects of intellectual property ("IP"), such as patents, software or confidential know-how that is brought into the collaboration as an existing IP or may arise in the project, third party IP and the use of IP after the project.
Liability and indemnification
Applicable law and place of jurisdiction

Please note that services provided by third parties as subcontractors of ETH Zurich may be subject to VAT. The VAT experts of the Accounting Department will be happy to advise you.

US public funding agencies

Contracts with US public funding agencies (offices such as NIH, NSF, DOE, DARPA etc., and US universities) are centrally administrated by EU GrantsAccess and require the approval of the Vice President of Research. The instructions regarding the handling of contributions (grants) from US funding institutions to research projects of ETH Zurich, RSETHZ 442, are applicable.

Non-public US funding agencies and contract partners

Contracts with all private US contractual partners (such as companies and foundations) are handled by the Research Contracts Group and usually require the approval of the Vice President of Research.

US Laboratories

Several US National Laboratories (e. g. Argonne National Lab (ANL), Brookhaven National Lab, SLAC National Accelerator Lab, EMSL: Environmental Molecular Sciences Lab) require researchers who wish to use the infrastructure of these laboratories to sign a Non-Proprietary User Agreement.

ETH Zurich has concluded a general contract with some of these laboratories, but each user must still sign an individual agreement with the National Laboratory. Please contact the Research Contracts Group for further information.

Publishers

For contracts with publishers, please contact the legal service of ETH Zurich.

Companies

For contracts with companies, please contact the responsible person of the Research Contracts Group.