Deadline for submission: 5 September 2017
The “Frontline” – Research Excellence Programme (KKP_17) provides targeted funding to world-class researchers – i.e. the best performers (belonging to the top 10%) in their respective fields of science according to the call – in their most dynamic and creative career phases enabling them to help bridging the gap between Hungary and the developed countries by implementing promising research projects as pioneering leaders in the forefront of international research. By promoting the most outstanding discovery research projects the funding scheme finally fills the gap that could not be filled by the calls facilitating domestic discovery research (K_17, FK_17, NN_17, PD_17 etc.) due to their nature, volume of available budget or the maximum amount of funding per project.
The KKP_17 call is only open to basic research projects without thematic restrictions provided that the applicant’s professional CV and research plan meet the requirements set out in the call. Applicants have the highest chance if they have achieved internationally outstanding scientific results in the past five years and can be reasonably expected to continue this world-class performance on the basis of their research plan.
The call is financed from the National Research, Development and Innovation Fund.
Submission of project proposals
Project proposals can be submitted electronically through the Online Application Portal of the NRDI Office by 4:00 p.m. on 5 September 2017 in line with the Guidelines for Applicants. The submission is successful if the proposal was finalised electronically by the applicant and approved by the head of the host institution by the deadline for electronic submission, and if all required documents, provided with original signatures and seal, were sent by postal mail to the Customer Service of the NRDI Office by 12 September 2017 (date of posting). Proposals may not be submitted only electronically or in person.
All proposals must be submitted in English irrespective of the field of science.
Who can apply:
Researchers (leading researchers) with Hungarian or foreign nationality must apply jointly with the host institution which must be
- a higher education institution, research centre, research institution, budgetary organ or an institution thereof having legal personality if it qualifies as a research facility under the RDI Act.
- a non-profit organisation pursuing research and development as core activity
domiciled in Hungary and having legal personality.
At the time of application and throughout the entire implementation period the leading researcher must be a full-time worker of the host institution under an employment contract, civil service contract, works contract or other contract aimed at performing work.
Requirements for leading researchers
- The leading researcher must have a PhD/DLA degree and must belong to a Hungarian host institution.
- Leaders of projects selected for funding in this call may not apply for funding from the Researchers' Thematic Applications Programme in the first 36 months of the funding period.
- Leading researchers must fall within the top 10% of their respective fields of science (for the detailed criteria of research, publication or application performance and international embeddedness see the call for proposals).
Eligible objectives and actions
Those actions are eligible which aim to achieve the key objectives developed on the basis of the research and work plan specified in the “Frontline” – Research Excellence Programme (KKP_17) call and set out in the research project plan submitted to the NRDI Office.
Available budget
The total budget earmarked from the NRDI Fund for the implementation of the programme between 2018 and 2022 is HUF 3 billion (EUR 9.8 million), including HUF 600 million (EUR 1.9 million) to be disbursed in 2018.
Maximum grant per project
The maximum amount of grant for the maximum duration of 60 months is HUF 300 million (nearly EUR 1 million) per project (an annual average of HUF 60 million i.e. EUR 0.2 million) as non-refundable funding. Maximum grant intensity is 100%.
Duration of the project
The project must start no earlier than 1 January 2018 and must be implemented within 60 months from the start date. Eligible project costs can be declared from the start date specified in the grant agreement.
Customer service contacts:
email: nkfialap@nkfih.gov.hu
phone: +36 (1) 795 9500
Personal appointments (pree-booked only): H-1077 Budapest, Kéthly Anna sq. 1. (2nd floor)
Customer Service hours of operation: Monday-Thursday from 9 a.m to 4 p.m., Friday from 9 a.m. to 12.00 a.m.
In the “Frontline” Research Excellence Programme elaborated and announced for the first time by the National Research, Development and Innovation Office, 12 research group leaders have won grants of HUF 150 million to 300 million (nearly EUR 0.5 to 1 million) each, of a total budget of HUF 3 billion, to be spent in the coming five years on creating or expanding their research group and implementing a promising discovery research project in Hungary. 45 project proposals were submitted, with funding requests of HUF 11.5 billion (nearly EUR 38 million) in total. 80% of the applications (both in terms of quantity and the requested funding) were submitted from the fields of mathematics, physics, chemical and engineering sciences, medical and biological sciences. Remaining applications are equally split between humanities/social sciences and agricultural/ecological/environmental/earth sciences. Funding decisions were made in a multi-stage assessment process based on anonymous peer reviews and panel evaluation, supplemented with presentations by the applicants. Firstly, each project proposal was evaluated by four anonymous experts, amongst them at least one foreigner, invited by the NRDI Office upon the proposal of the disciplinary panels. Based on the peer reviews, an expert group proposed by the disciplinary panels evaluated the project proposals one by one against the selection criteria set out in the call for proposals, and invited twenty shortlisted applicants to present their project proposals in person. After the project presentations the expert group made a proposal for the decision. FUNDED PROJECTSFunding organisation: NRDI Office
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To ensure value-based professional evaluation of proposals arriving in large quantities from the fields of discovery and applied research and innovation, to assess professional reports of funded projects and to prepare policy opinions, the NRDI Office intends to expand its expert pool in all fields of expertise.
Professionals who have registered in the database of the NRDI Office can become responsible contributors, as independent peer-reviewers, to the evaluation process in which the professional quality, novelty content and commercialisation perspectives of the proposals as compared to the requested funding should be assessed as core considerations.
The registration process can be initiated through the registration form of the NRDI Office’s website. Registration is continuously open.
Requested data within the expert registration form include:
- personal data, contact details (necessary for contracting review assignments);
- classification of professional skills and competencies and research areas (to get review invitations fine-tuned to your field of expertise);
- topics of the previously reviewed proposals;
- present and past jobs, interest networks (in order to pre-screening of conflicts of interest in a given rview assignment), education, scientific titles, most important publications and intellectual works demonstrating your professional experience;
- language skills.
Professionals once registered in the database of experts may be invited by the NRDI Office to review submitted proposals, to assess professional reports of funded projects and to contribute to policy opinions.
Each proposal is reviewed by several independent experts at the same time. Experts selected from the database to review proposals, to assess professional reports and facilitate expert opinions will be contracted by the NRDI Office on a case-by-case basis. When concluding such a contract experts must declare that the review assignment is not obstructed by any conflict of interest whatsoever. Depending on the competition type, written expert reviews must be prepared in 15-28 work days and submitted electronically via the online review portal of the NRDI Office.
FURTHER INFORMATION
For further information contact at phone +36 1 795 9500 or email at szakerto_regisztracio@nkfih.gov.hu