Consortium Projects for Clinical Translation
Aim of the program
Create the desired impact of sustainably improving quality of life and life expectancy for patients by investing in multidisciplinary teams who can best generate scientific innovation and translate this into clinical, practice-changing outcomes.
Areas of the program
The Foundation focuses its grant making on areas of unmet medical needs, where scientific and/or clinical evidence with the potential for groundbreaking advances for patients exist.
This year, two calls are open. Within each category, the Foundation aims to fund one project:
- “Brain Health” – specific focus on Mental Health, Psychiatry and Neurology
- “All Medical Areas”
Duration, volume and location of funding
- Duration of funding: 3 years
- Volume of funding: maximum CHF 1 million per annum
- In specifically justified cases, a 4th year of funding of CHF 1 million might be granted
- The clinical translation must be predominantly pursued in Switzerland
Eligibility criteria
- The consortium must be composed of a minimum of two and a maximum of five applicants.
- Applicants’ fields of expertise must be complementary and collectively cover the whole breadth of project activities.
- The lead applicant must be an independent group leader at a Swiss university, research institute or hospital.
- The lead applicant shall produce documentation about their ability to lead a multi-investigator consortium.
- At least one applicant must be a physician scientist with clinical responsibility.
- Most applicants must be active in Switzerland.
- The application must comply with the Foundation's purpose as well as with international standards for medical ethics.
Evaluation process
Criteria
Projects are evaluated and compared on the basis of excellence along the following dimensions:
- Unmet medical need
- Clinical translation
- Scientific originality
- Interdisciplinarity / team coherence
- Investigators' track record
- Feasibility
- Budget justification and coherence
Process
The evaluation is conducted in a three-step evaluation by the Foundation and a committee of selected international evaluators. The three steps are:
1) Structured summary
2) Full proposal (selected from submitted short proposals)
3) Hearing (selected from submitted full proposals)
Deadline and decisions
Structured summary and full proposal must be submitted simultaneously.
The submission deadline is Tuesday, July 01, 2025 (end of day).
Rejection or notification that the Full Proposal is under review will be communicated during the week commencing August 25, 2025.
The hearings will be held on the following days in Zurich and the full team should be available:
- Brain Health: October 29, 2025
- All Medical Areas: October 31, 2025
The Foundation communicates its funding decision during the week commencing December 15, 2025.
The Foundation does not provide feedback on its decisions.
Structure of applications
Please use the templates for the structured summary and full proposal as well as for the budget which can be downloaded below.
Please submit in pdf format the two documents (structured summary and full proposal - which includes the budget) via email to applications@helmut-horten-stiftung.org. The email subject line should read: 2025-CON First name Last name.
The Foundation will acknowledge receipt of the application.
Please note: Non-compliance with the application format and process will result in rejection to ensure fairness in the selection process.