Call for Proposals
Call for Proposals
Funding through Innovation Booster in Robotics
Call for proposals next deadline:
September 1st, 2025
Innovation Booster Robotics Call for Proposals
Radical Innovation
The Innovation Booster programme intends to foster risk-taking and testing of radical ideas. Proposals with higher potential for radical vs. incremental innovation will receive higher marks.
Definition of radical innovation idea:
Radical innovation aims at a revolutionary character of innovation and can include new products, services or processes with new characteristics or forms, so that industries or markets are developed or changed, but not destroyed. In contrast, an incremental innovation idea is an evolutionary development of something that already exists. Some examples: the fridge allows us to preserve food for more than one day; the moving assembly line allowed Henry Ford to produce a car in 90 minutes instead of 12 hours; smartphones melt internet, telephone and TV into one device; and streaming on demand services bring the cinema into the living room. All examples have revolutionized the market and changed everyday life.
To learn more about radical innovation, please click on: YouTube Chanel of Innosuisse.
Who?
Open to any stakeholders in the Swiss robotics ecosystem (teams must be composed of at minimum two partners from two different entities in Switzerland). Innovation teams must consist of at least one research partner and one implementation partner. Submissions require prior participation in or joining a team from a challenge stage workshop organized by the Booster.
Research partners can include university research institutes, non-commercial research centers outside the university sector, departmental research institutions with their own research projects and federal research institutes.
Implementation partners are those actors who implement the innovation ideas, thus creating economic added value. These can be incorporated start-ups, SMEs or larger companies that offer products or services or implement processes. However, they can also be non-profit organizations such as municipal administrations that can generate societal benefits and reduce public costs through the implementation of innovation.
What?
We support the testing of the desirability, viability, and feasibility of an idea. These include costs for testing hypotheses, creating prototypes, market studies or the methodical support of idea testing by external coaches.
Submitted proposals for funding must have been generated or significantly developed during the Innovation Booster’s challenge stage activities.
How much?
Funding Amount: 25,000 CHF
Implementation partner contribution: 7,500 CHF
The 8th Call for Proposals – Next deadline: 1 September 2025
There is no specific focus area for the calls, but submitted proposals for funding must have been generated or significantly developed during the Innovation Booster’s challenge stage activities. The limelight must be on radical innovation, new solutions, new end-uses, new business models, and addressing contemporary global issues. We invite you to participate in our challenge workshops and submit proposals addressing challenges generated during the workshops.
You can submit an application related to technological innovation as well as a conceptual innovation.
What do we mean by technological and conceptual innovation? Let us take an example from the drone industry. For example, you can provide an idea of a new autonomous drone with a new technology that has not been invented before. However, you can also provide an idea to assess a concept – a certain end-use of drone in a certain setting and promoting the use of drones in an unconventional and radical way.
Third-party contributions to innovation team funding
In addition to Innosuisse support, innovation teams can benefit from third-party contributions. The following types of contributions are eligible:
- Sponsoring
Funds provided by sponsors to support the innovation team’s idea exploration and development. - Partner-to-partner contributions
A cash contribution made by one team partner to one or several other team partners.
Important: Team partners who make a partner-to-partner contribution cannot receive Innosuisse or other third-party contributions at the same time. - External materials and services
Team partners may contribute by covering the costs of external materials or services for the benefit of the team.
Important: These expenses must be additional to the total Innosuisse contribution and any other third-party contributions used in the project.
The following are not considered third-party contributions:
- Cash self-contributions from partners who already receive Innosuisse or third-party funding.
- In-kind contributions provided in the form of goods or services.
- Public contributions from public sector bodies or public actors.
