Commissioning research capability, facilities and specialist analysis
Scientific research is bought in three distinguishable ways and the notices look similar. The first is a commissioned programme: the buyer defines a question and funds a team to investigate it. The second is access to capability -- beam time, vessel time, controlled environment facilities, computing -- where the buyer is purchasing time on an asset it cannot justify owning. The third is routine analytical service, where samples are sent and results returned against a method and a turnaround. Each has different qualification and different economics.
Quality assurance is the recurring requirement. Laboratories are expected to hold accreditation for the specific methods in scope, participate in proficiency testing, maintain traceable calibration and documented chain of custody for samples, and report uncertainty alongside results. For work that may be used in regulation or litigation, those requirements harden further and the reporting format itself becomes specified. An accreditation held for a neighbouring method does not satisfy a requirement written for this one.
Data and publication terms are as commercially significant as the price. Public and donor funders increasingly require research data to be deposited under open conditions with defined metadata, and require resulting publications to be openly accessible, which has cost and timing implications a bid should carry. Ethical approval, biosafety and containment levels, animal research licensing, export and transfer controls on materials, and access and benefit-sharing obligations for genetic resources are conditions precedent with their own lead times, and they are the usual reason an award does not translate into a start.
This section describes how this category is bought generally, across the public buyers that publish it. The figures elsewhere on this page are measured for this market alone.
Who buys scientific research in Switzerland?
GlobalGov holds 34 scientific research records from 29 distinct buying organisations in Switzerland. The most frequent publishers are European Commission, INTPA - International Partnerships (3 records); Office fédéral de l'énergie OFEN (3 records); Universität Zürich Assetmanagement (2 records); Agroscope, Beschaffungsmanagement (1 record); Amt für Wirtschaft und Tourismus Graubünden (AWT) (1 record); Bildungsdirektion Kanton Zürich Bildungsplanung (1 record). Between them the 6 largest account for 32% of everything published, so buying here is spread across many separate authorities.
| Buying organisation | Records | Share |
|---|---|---|
| European Commission, INTPA - International Partnerships | 3 | 8.8% |
| Office fédéral de l'énergie OFEN | 3 | 8.8% |
| Universität Zürich Assetmanagement | 2 | 5.9% |
| Agroscope, Beschaffungsmanagement | 1 | 2.9% |
| Amt für Wirtschaft und Tourismus Graubünden (AWT) | 1 | 2.9% |
| Bildungsdirektion Kanton Zürich Bildungsplanung | 1 | 2.9% |
How long do bidders get to respond to scientific research tenders in Switzerland?
Across the 14 Switzerland scientific research notices that publish both a publication date and a closing date, the median response window is 42 days. A quarter of them allowed 41 days or fewer and a quarter stayed open for more than 56. Not one of them closed within a fortnight of being published, so the window on this market is consistently workable.
How often are scientific research tenders published in Switzerland?
Switzerland has published nothing in this category in the last twelve months. Over the last three years there were 18, spread across 27 separate months of activity since 6 August 2021. October is historically the busiest month. No new notice has been published in this category since 14 May 2025, 505 days ago, so treat the figures above as a record of the market rather than as this week's pipeline.
How does Switzerland compare with other scientific research markets?
Among the 21 countries where GlobalGov holds a comparable scientific research market, Switzerland ranks 19th by number of records. The largest is Germany (1,240 records against 34 here). Within Switzerland itself, scientific research is the 45th largest of the 56 procurement categories tracked here.
Where do the Switzerland scientific research records on this page come from?
These 34 records are collected from 1 official source: TED (34). GlobalGov is an independent aggregator and is not affiliated with any of them; each record links back to the notice on its issuing portal. The set is rebuilt nightly, and the counts on this page were taken on 2026-10-01.
Most recent Scientific Research tenders in Switzerland
No individual notice in this category currently has a public record page. The market figures above are computed over all 34 records GlobalGov holds for it.
Other procurement categories in Switzerland
Scientific Research procurement in other markets
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