Clinical Incubator Funding Opportunity 2023
Ad-Hoc Grant to Advance Translational Research
Why do we offer the Ad-Hoc Grant?
With the Ad-Hoc Grant, we wish to provide scientists in the BIH-Charité network with a funding opportunity that quickly meets the needs of translationally oriented research projects in order to realise the next steps into the clinic. This funding aims to overcome the limitations of established funding schemes and allows you to realise key steps, overcome hurdles and bottlenecks on the way to clinical evaluation of your research project. The Ad-Hoc Grant is intended to support you in carrying out e.g. tox- and other analyses, a health technology assessment, a specific regulatory consultation/medical writing or to make small investments that are needed.
Who is eligible to apply for the Ad-Hoc Grant?
Teams consisting of at least two scientists from different research groups from within the BIH-Charité network are eligible to apply. Please note that at least one of the scientists must have a BIH affiliation. Team members can be at any stage of their career, from MD or PhD students to professors.
At which stage should you be on the path of clinical translation?
You should be clearly on the translational path and require funding for one of the following scenarios:
(a) You already conduct a clinical trial and are funded by third-party funding organizations (BMBF, DFG, EU, etc.) but you identified a remaining funding gap.
(b) You are about to start a clinical trial but require final data or expert advice to obtain third-party funding for a trial (phase I-III).
(c) You perform pre-clinical research essential for approaching regulatory authorities and require funding for additional studies of the kind, or to receive formal advice for entering a clinical trial.
(d) You are developing a platform technology that you or others need to enter clinical trials and you need funding to technically advance or test the technology.
Please note
Basic research and early proof of principle studies are explicitly excluded from funding.
What does the Ad-Hoc Grant offer?
The Ad-Hoc Grant provides up to €50,000 to advance translationally oriented research. The money can be used for project-specific laboratory consumables or equipment, for assignments with BIH Core facilities or other service providers, as well as for consultancy fees or other fees incurred in translation research.
Please note
The funds must be spent in 2023 and cannot be carried over to the next year. You therefore need to ensure that you can place the order within the Charité purchasing deadlines for 2023 and in accordance with the valid purchasing guidelines.
The teams that receive the Ad-Hoc Grant commit to submitting a report by 31.03.2024 showing what the funds were used for and how they helped to advance the project.
What do you need to submit in order to apply for the Ad-Hoc Grant?
- Completed application form, which is available on the following pages.
- At least one scientist must have a BIH affiliation and must indicate this in the application form.
- Documents that demonstrate where you are on the path of clinical translation (see above, under “At which stage should you be on the path of clinical translation?”).
- Quotations for the planned equipment or research services (if applicable).
- A written confirmation from the Core Unit, that the money can be accounted for in 2023 (if applicable).
- A self-running audio PowerPoint presentation*, which must be no longer than 10 minutes (length of the submitted presentation in total).
* Here you can find instructions how to set up a self-running audio PowerPoint presentation, or you may want to watch this video instruction.
Please note
The presentation should be structured according to the evaluation criteria in the attached PDF-file “Evaluation Criteria.pdf”. Please pay close attention to the weights assigned to the criteria to understand their importance and how much time, roughly, you should dedicate to each evaluation criterion.
Please send the documents to booster@bih-charite.de
Applications lacking one of these items will not be considered for funding
How and by whom will your proposal be evaluated?
Proposals will be evaluated by reviewers from within and outside of the BIH/Charité network. All reviewers are subject to confidentiality.
The evaluation criteria and the weights assigned to each one of them can be found in the PDF-file: Evaluation Criteria.pdf.
When is the deadlines for application?
Please submit your application documents no later than 4 July 2023.
Discussion of your proposal
Teams who submitted an eligible proposal will have to discuss their project proposal online with members of the evaluation committee on 12 July 2023 from 12:00 onwards. At least one of the applicants should discuss the proposal in a short, approx. 8-minute (Microsoft Teams) meeting to justify the proposal. Other team members can also participate if they wish.
In addition, please ensure that you can be reached during the period from 4 to 12 July 2023 for any queries the jury members may have on your proposal. Therefore, please provide contact details where you can be easily reached.
Award Announcement
The awarded proposals will be announced by 15 July 2023.