‘Good to know’ Edition 3/2021

‘Good to know.’

How foundations support innovations in research.

Have you ever wondered how someone wins a Nobel Prize? When you read Michel Mayor’s stories, you will understand how exciting this is. Look at the annual figures for the individual stages and you can see how much work, curiosity and patience is behind it. This astronomer won a Nobel Prize in 2019 for his discovery of the first planet outside our solar system. A location home to research and education is characterised by these top-flight achievements. Breadth, accessibility and in particular the dual education pathway are the cornerstones of our prosperity – and the state guarantees the lion’s share of this. Nevertheless, private funds, donations and funding from foundations are becoming increasingly important. Although they do not add up to the same volume, they are more flexible in terms of allocation, which means they can support higher risk projects, enabling them to provide targeted momentum and supplement state funding. And the successful collaboration between the state, private funders and foundations is more important than ever: access to the EU’s Horizon funding programme has been called into question, meaning that Switzerland as a research location is under pressure to maintain its competitive edge in the European research market. In this issue, we would like to share our knowledge about the extensive involvement of foundations in research and
education.