ICT25 / Submission Guideline / Full Proposal

This section is a guide to using WWTF’s Funding Portal. It is intended for applicants who wish to submit a full proposal in the ICT25 Call.

ICT25 / Submission Process

About the Submission Process 

Submission of full proposals -> External written reviews -> Applicant response -> Jury meeting to select projects for funding -> Funding Decision via WWTF Board of Directors (early October 2025).

ICT25 / Login and go to your proposal

About the Funding Portal

Please note that only the coordinating PI (PI&C) can submit the proposal.

Login and go to your proposal

  1. Go to https://fundingportal.wwtf.at/
  2. Login with your credentials
  3. You will see an overview of your proposal(s) and role(s) under the menu “My Proposals & Roles"

image.png

ICT25 / Update information about PIs

Contact details, CV, and information about your role in the project have been automatically transferred from the short proposal to the full proposal. Please ensure your contact details are up-to-date. To update your CV, delete the previous document and upload a new CV as PDF.

Update “Roles and responsibilities within project” and “Specific competencies for the project” only if relevant. Please describe convincingly your expertise to accomplish the work in the project. Make sure that the information provided here is in accordance with the according chapter of the Work Programme upload. 

Step 1: Update your “Profile” if relevant

Upon login, go to “My Profile” in the top menu to update your profile. Please upload or update your CV based on the template provided. 

Please use the CV template provided in the Funding Portal. Please use the following template:"All other calls: wwtf_cvtemplate_project.docx"

Different CVs in case of the submission of two proposals

 

Applicants have the possibility to submit two proposals. This may necessitate slightly different versions of the CV (publications specific to the proposals). In this case, the following procedure is recommended:

Now, the CV is imported from your profile to Proposal A, and only to Proposal A! 

As a result, Proposal A and B should have different CVs. 

Do not exceed 2 pages for the CV, as the system will not accept the upload of documents longer than 2 pages.

Step 2: Update your “Role” if relevant

Go to “My Proposal & Roles” in the top menu. Under “My Roles”, click on your role below the title of the proposal.

Please note that the information entered here should be specific to the project. If you are participating in multiple proposals that require different subsets of your expertise, please tailor the information according to the project.

ICT25 / Overview of chapters

The proposal is comprised of six chapters, each under a separated tab:

A chapter with a red alert symbol indicates that it is incomplete. Within the marked chapter, click on the red symbol(s) beside individual sections to highlight the fields requiring attention.  A green checkmark symbol indicates that the information in the chapter is complete.

Please note that the symbols might not refresh immediately even if the information in the chapter is complete. Changing to another chapter and going back to the other will refresh the symbol. 

ICT25 / Details of chapters

Basic Information

This chapter contains basic information about the full proposal, including title, scientific disciplines involved, keywords, duration, and type of project (i.e., regular WWTF Project or Joint Project). Fill out fields as required.

Please note:

In order to suggest eligible and unique reviewers, the jury will be informed about the reviewers suggested and excluded by the applicants. The reviewers nominated by the applicants will be not be disclosed to the reviewers themselves. Each proposal is generally reviewed by four (and no less than three) reviewers.

Personnel and Institutions

Please note that the addition, removal, or substitution of core team members (PI&C, co-PIs) are not permitted at this stage. WWTF may make exceptions in well-argued circumstances (e.g., a co-PI moving to an institution abroad or leaving the academic field). Please contact WWTF in such a case. WWTF reserves the right to exclude projects from further evaluation in cases in which PIs can no longer be part of the project team. 

Further partner institutions: Collaborating institutions beyond those of the core team members can be added in this stage. Please note that every person involved in the project must be linked to an institution in order to allow indication of time commitment and salary in the “Budget” section. A signature will be required from the authorizing persons at the core team members’ institutions and at all further partner institutions. A maximum of five different institutions (including those of the core team members) is permitted. Should a project be funded, the addition of further collaborations will be possible.

Project

This chapter contains the scientific work programme. Fill out the following fields:

Please note that the character limit includes spaces

Lay summary (1,000 characters)

Please provide a description of your proposed research that is suitable for the general public. This will primarily be used by WWTF for communicating your work to non-experts for fundraising and public relations purposes. 

Scientific abstract (2,000 characters) 

Please provide a concise scientific abstract of the project. This will be used in approaching reviewers. 

Work programme: Please use the template provided for download in the WWTF Funding Portal. The headings in bold are mandatory (details and guiding questions can be found in the template). Upload the completed document as PDF (max. 15 pages including figures)

1. Introduction and background

2. Hypotheses and objectives 

3. Innovativeness and expected results

4. Methodological approach 

5. Mid- to long-term academic and societal impacts

6. Project team 

7. Key references 

Please note that potential sex/gender aspects of the research topic and gender balance in the research team should be considered throughout the application (see this section). These should be briefly described where appropriate in the relevant sections.

Ethical considerations (500 characters)

Indicate if ethical approval of an ethics committee or institutional review board is required for the project. If so, please describe the potential ethical aspects and upload the ethical approval(s) as a single PDF. There is no page limit for the approvals, but the document may not exceed 10 MB. If no ethical aspects are identified, please also provide a brief statement.

Data Management (500 characters) 

In case of funding, a detailed data management plan must be submitted at the start of the project. At the full proposal stage, we encourage applicants to consider and briefly address the following points as appropriate:

Use of generative AI (800 characters)

Please describe if and how GenAI has been used in developing your research proposal. Please see further details here.

Budget

Please note the following guidelines for the budget:

Personnel costs

Non-personnel costs

Budget per region

Cost overview

Explanation of Cost Planning (2500 characters) 

Disclosure of other applications for funding (750 characters) 

ICT25 / Signatures

Submission of the proposal requires the signatures of the authorized person(s) at the host institutions of each of the PI&C and co-PIs (“Authorization”) and all partner institutions. 

Please ensure signatures are dated. Undated signatures and re-use of signatures from the short proposal will not be accepted.

Unlike proposals in the previous Submission System, signatures from the core team are no longer required in the new Funding Portal.

ICT25 / Proposal submission

Once all symbols in all chapters are marked by green checkmarks, the proposal can be submitted. The “Submit proposal” button is at the bottom of the “Signatures” chapter. 

The PI&C will receive an automatic confirmation email when the Funding Portal receives the completed submission. Please check your emails after hitting the submit button. If you do not receive a confirmation email, please get in touch with the Call Manager.

You can access your submitted proposal as PDF on the page “My Proposals and Roles”. 

No changes are possible after the project has been submitted. After the indicated deadline, submission is no longer possible. Unsubmitted proposals will be excluded from the ensuing evaluation process.

ICT25 / Applicant Response Phase

Applicant Response Phase (22nd - 29th of August 2025, 2pm (CET))

The purpose of the applicant response step is to allow the core team to correct any factual errors or conceptual misunderstandings in the external peer reviews. The applicants should respond directly to reviewer comments in a constructive manner.

Scope of applicant response

As much as possible, the applicant response should refer to parts of the full proposal where the reviewer’s concerns are already addressed. Only where necessary and appropriate, should references to peer-reviewed publications in order to correct any factual inaccuracies in the reviews be provided. In addition to providing the DOI, applicants should clearly specify the section (figure, data, text) of the publication that supports their response. Pictures, graphs, or other documents themselves cannot be inserted or attached.

Process for applicants

What will happen to the applicant response?

Submission of a response to reviews is not compulsory. However, the jury panel will be informed that all teams were provided with the opportunity to respond to reviews.