Operating Grant: 2012-2013 – Funding Decisions Notification (September 2012 Competition – 201209MOP)

Determination of Grants Approved

In approving the results of the Operating Grant: 2012-2013 (September 2012) competition, Scientific Council (SC) took into account:

• the commitment to fund at least 400 grants and to maintain or increase the average value of these grants;
• the need to provide the highest level of funding, considering the constraints on CIHR's budget;
• the balance between size of grant and number of grants awarded;
• the establishment of a specific maximum portion of the budget ($12.5M) for large grants;
• the continuing commitment to follow rank order in the funding of all applications to CIHR competitions; and
• the integration of the Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) program into the Open Operating Grants Program.

Some Facts

• Total applications in the competition: 2333
• Fundable applications (rated ≥3.5): 1610
• Total non-RCT applications: 2137
• Total RCT applications: 196
• Total large grant applications (within totals above): 30
• Total fundable non-RCT: 1504
• Total fundable RCT: 106
• Total fundable large grants (within totals above): 21
• Total funded non-RCT: 366
• Total funded RCT: 35
• Total funded large grants (within totals above): 5
• Operating grants funded from the core competition budget: 401
• Est. number of additional full term Operating grants funded through Priority Announcements¹: 17
• Est. number of additional bridge grants funded through Priority Announcements¹ and other sources: 67
• Data below on average grant size and average grant duration are calculated based on the grant size and duration post peer review (and after the across the board cut) for funded grants. This will differ from annual corporate statistics which are based on actual grants paid out.

  Total est. number of grants approved within the Operating Grant: 2012-2013 (September) competition: 485

• Large grants: The total number of grants approved includes 5 large grants with an average total grant size of $2.4 M. In the current competition any grant with an annual average value of $390,711 or more was considered a large grant.
• Average full term total grant size from the Operating Grant 2012-2013 (September) competition: $600,176.
• Median full term total grant size from the Operating Grant 2012-2013 (September) competition: $438,018.
• Average duration of full term grants: 3.9 years.
• Funding of these grants was made possible by reducing the recommended budgets of the funded proposals by a maximum 24% over peer review recommended amounts. Nevertheless, we were able to maintain the average value of grant compared to the previous competition and still afford to fund 400 grants.

Level of Investment

• Est. core competition investment: $240.7 million over six years, approximately the same amount invested for the previous competition.
• Est. Full-Term Priority Announcement investment: $ 6.0 million.
• Est. Bridge grant investment: $ 6.7 million.

Other facts and frequently asked questions relating to the Open Operating Grant Program are available on the CIHR website, in the document CIHR Open Operating Grant Program Competitions – Frequently Asked Questions.

Additional Notes

Since some of the applications were approved conditional on meeting certain conditions, these specific applications will not appear in the detailed funding decisions database until and unless conditions are met.

The deadline for receipt of applications to the next (March 2013) Operating grant competition is Friday March 1, 2013 by 8:00 p.m. ET. All applicants who intend to submit an application to this competition must register their intent to apply to CIHR by Friday, February 1, 2013 8:00 p.m. ET (Note the change in time which was previously midnight and is now 8:00 p.m. ET).

Visit our website for more information on the registration process. Applications will be accepted only from those who have registered by the deadline on Friday, February 1, 2013 by 8:00 p.m. ET. If you register and then decide not to apply, please notify CIHR as soon as possible to indicate that you are withdrawing from the competition.

CIHR remains committed to supporting applicants in completing and submitting their CCVs as part of their applications to CIHR. Although significant CCV improvements have been made in response to your feedback, we recognize that there is still more work to be done to improve the CCV and its usability. Therefore, CIHR will continue to be flexible in accepting all types of contributions as attachments for the upcoming competitions, and remains committed to working with applicants to address other issues as they arise while completing their CCVs. CIHR has created guidelines for helping focus efforts on completing only those elements of the CCV which are necessary for application to the upcoming competitions.

Funding Decisions Data Report

• 201209MOP: Access the "Operating Grant" funding decisions data report.