Public Sector PhD Project – Doctoral Project in the Public Sector 2024

The applicant must be a public sector body. The public body must normally receive 80 per cent or more of its financing through public funding. Public funding can be acquired through direct public allocations, but also through public procurements. 

A "public sector body" is defined as state enterprises, regional or local authorities, bodies governed by public law and associations formed by one or several such authorities that carry out tasks on behalf of public agencies (see the Research Council’s Definition Public Body). Non-profit service suppliers that receive at least 80 per cent of their income through public procurements fall within the target group for this scheme. 

Organisations defined as approved research organisations by the Research Council are not eligible to apply for Public Sector PhD projects (see the Research Council’s definition of approved research organisations). This includes Technology Transfer Offices (TTO) and health trusts/hospitals. 

State aid is not permitted under the Public Sector PhD Scheme, and companies defined as an undertaking in the state aid rules may therefore not apply or participate as a partner in a Public Sector PhD project. More information about this is presented below. 

The Research Council will only provide support to doctoral candidates who have not previously completed a doctoral degree/PhD. The scheme does not provide support for completion of doctoral degree educations that are already underway. 

The Project Owner and applicant for Research Council funding must be a public sector body (as defined above). The degree-conferring institution must be a partner in the Public Sector PhD project. 

The Research Council stipulates the following requirements for the project and project participants: 

Requirements relating to the Public Body (Project Owner) 

• The public sector body is the formal applicant and must fall within the scheme’s target group. Please note that the Research Council may request additional documentation to determine whether the applicant satisfies this requirement. If you are uncertain as to whether the public entity is within the target group, please contact the Research Council’s contact points for the Public Sector PhD Scheme before you submit your application. 
• The doctoral project must be of clear relevance to the applicant (public sector body) and its long-term needs for expertise. 
• The doctoral research project must reflect the public entity’s plans for research and development and be approved by the entity’s decision-making bodies in the organisation. 
• The public entity must be able to secure funding for the entire duration of the project, also in the case of delays. 
• The public entity is to appoint a dedicated supervisor/mentor for the project and set aside sufficient time and resources to follow up the doctoral project. The role of internal supervisor is to be filled by an individual with expertise of relevance to the thematic orientation of the project. If the supervisor does not have a doctoral degree he or she will be defined as a "mentor". A supervisor/mentor may be contracted from an external actor if the public entity does not have the relevant expertise. 
• The doctoral candidate must be a permanent employee in the public sector body no later than from the time of application. The doctoral candidate is to be employed in a full-time position for a period of three years for three-year projects, and at least 75 per cent of a full-time position for four-year projects. The terms of the candidate’s employment contract and working conditions must be in compliance with Norwegian regulations. 

Requirements relating to the degree-conferring institution 

• The degree-conferring institution has the responsibility for ensuring that the doctoral project maintains an adequately high scientific standard. Under the scheme, the doctoral project must meet the same requirements for scientific quality set out for other doctoral projects undertaken at the institution and must follow the institution’s regulations for doctoral degree education with regard to admissions, implementation and evaluation. Please note: the Research Council does not conduct any scientific assessment or quality assurance of the project, but assumes that this will have been carried out by the degree-conferring institution. 
• The admission process must be underway at the time the grant application is submitted. The candidate must have been granted admission to a relevant doctoral degree programme at the degree-conferring institution. The documents confirming admission may be forwarded when they are available.
• If the degree-conferring institution is outside Norway, applicants must submit documentation that the degree from the institution abroad is on a par with a doctoral degree obtained from a Norwegian university. 

Requirements relating to cooperation and project organisation 

• The Public Sector PhD project must be planned and implemented as a collaborative effort between the Project Owner and the degree-conferring institution. 
• The Project Owner and the degree-conferring institution must enter into a written collaboration agreement. The process to draw up a collaboration agreement must be underway at the time the grant application is submitted, but the agreement does not have to be finalised at that time. The agreement must satisfy the Public Sector PhD Scheme’s special requirements for collaboration agreements (see separate section below). The signed collaboration agreement is to be attached to the contract between the Research Council and the Project Owner. 
• The Project Owner and the degree-conferring institution must jointly be able to provide the candidate with a satisfactory professional and scientific environment and adequate scientific supervision and administrative support for completing the doctoral project. 
• The Project Owner and the degree-conferring institution must hold at least one project meeting per semester. The main supervisor from the degree-conferring institution, candidate, project manager and internal mentor/supervisor from the public entity must attend the project meetings. Meeting minutes must be submitted to the Research Council no later than 14 days after the meeting has taken place. 
• The doctoral candidate participating in the project must be designated at the time the grant application is submitted. Funding will not be granted to projects that do not specify a candidate’s name. 
• The candidate is required to spend at least one year at the degree-conferring institution and at least one year at the public entity during the project period. This also applies if the degree-conferring institution is located outside Norway. Each stay may be carried out in stages as several shorter-term visits rather than over one continuous period. Provided that there is adequate scientific justification for doing so and the partners in the project are in agreement, candidates are allowed to replace the stay at the degree-conferring institution wholly or in part with stays at one or more institutions within the university and university college sector or at research institutes. 

Requirements relating to the collaboration agreement 

The public entity and the degree-conferring institution must enter into a written collaboration agreement. Feel free to use the doctoral agreement from the degree-conferring institution as the starting point for the collaboration agreement, but make sure that the following conditions are also in accordity or entered into: 

• The collaboration agreement is to apply for the entire project period. The project period is to be specified in the text of the agreement. 
• The ownership of results and issues pertaining to intellectual property rights must be adequately clarified. 
• The names, roles and employers of the supervisors from the degree-conferring institution and the company are to be specified. 
• The agreement must not prevent the candidate from publishing the results of his/her research and presenting them in his/her dissertation. This is to be specified in the agreement.  
• The agreement must specify that the candidate is to spend at least one year at the Project Owner (Public Body) and at least one year at the degree-conferring institution or at one or more institutions in the university and university college sector or a research institute. The time may be distributed in a manner that is most beneficial for the project. 
• It must be specified that the parties are required to conduct a collaboration meeting at least once per semester. 
• The agreement must clarify requirements relating to the work duties on the part of the doctoral candidate. This item may also be incorporated into a separate employment agreement between the candidate and the public entity. In the case of four-year projects, the site where the candidate is to carry out his or her work duties must be specified. 
• Project funding and the distribution of project costs for each partner participating in the doctoral project must be provided. 

More information about collaboration agreements is available on the Research Council's website. 

Requirements relating to collaboration with other actors 

The Public Sector PhD Scheme primarily targets individual public entities working in cooperation with a degree-conferring institution. It is also possible for multiple public entities to collaborate on a Public Sector PhD project provided that none of them is a company ("undertaking"). More information about "undertakings" is presented in the next section. Public Sector PhD projects involving the participation of multiple public entity partners must satisfy the following requirements in addition to the other requirements set out in the call: 

• Only one public sector body must serve as the Project Owner. 
• If other partners than the Project Owner (public sector body) and degree-conferring institution are to contribute funding, the Project Owner must contribute the largest proportion of project funding from partners with the exception of the degree-conferring institution when relevant. 
• Binding agreements must be signed between all the project partners. These agreements must clarify all relevant issues. 

Companies may not apply for or be a partner in a Public Sector PhD project. The Public Sector PhD Scheme is not permitted to provide state aid and companies ("undertakings" under the state aid rules) are therefore not eligible to apply for funding or be a partner in a Public Sector PhD project. An undertaking is defined in this context as an actor that carries out an economic activity consisting of offering products or services on a given market. An actor may be defined as an undertaking for part of its activity while not being considered an undertaking for other parts. If the actor (here the public entity) pursues some economic activity, then it is defined as an undertaking for this segment of its activity. The entity is not considered to be an undertaking for the segment of its activities that does not involve offering products or services on a given market. Only doctoral projects connected to an entity’s non-economic activity are eligible for funding under the scheme. The Research Council stipulates that the entity must have established a clear separation of accounts for its economic and non-economic activities. 

See more information about requirements for formal separation between economic and non-economic activities on the Research Council webpages. 

The Research Council can provide funding to cover eligible project costs directly related to completion of the doctoral project. Other related or overall R&D activities at the institution may not be incorporated into the budget. Approved costs include: 

• salary and personnel costs for the candidate; 
• salary and personnel costs for internal supervisors; 
• costs incurred by the degree-conferring institution (such as supervisory services and office space); 
• other operating costs (laboratory experiments, purchase of literature, conference-related travel, etc.). 

The public entity must set up a realistic budget in the grant application form showing all costs directly related to carrying out the doctoral project. The Research Council requires you to break down the project budget into the following cost categories: 

• Payroll and indirect expenses: salary and personnel costs for the public entity’s staff, including the candidate and internal supervisor, and salary and personnel costs for the degree-conferring institution. These costs are to be calculated on the basis of hourly rates for each individual participating in the project. The basis used to calculate costs, i.e. the costs included in the hourly rate, is to be described in the application (in the specification field under the budget tables). Different rules apply for the calculation of hourly rates for the public entity’s personnel and for staff at the degree-conferring institution. Please read the guidelines carefully and follow the examples of calculating hourly costs and indirect costs for the public enterprise: 

See the guidelines for Calculating payroll and indirect expenses for companies and the public sector. 

See the guidelines for Calculating payroll and indirect expenses for the university and university college sector. 

• Procurement of R&D services: costs related to the procurement of R&D services such as laboratory activity, analyses, etc., from an R&D supplier. 
• Equipment. Please note that there are restrictions on which equipment costs may be included in the budget. It is important to read the guidelines carefully. 
• Other operating expenses: costs related to purchase of literature, conference-related travel, other operating costs such as laboratory experiments, external advisors, etc. 

For definitions and other details relating to procurement of R&D services, equipment and other operating expenses, please see What to enter in the project budget. 

The Research Council encourages applicants to consult the payroll or finance department at their institution for help in drawing up a project budget. 

Calculating support 

The table below shows the maximum amount of support per year for three- and four-year Public Sector PhD projects. Funding is calculated from the time of project start. 

The funding is limited to a maximum of 50 per cent of total project costs.  

Funding will not be disbursed as a lump sum and will be adjusted to reflect costs entered in the accounts. Funding cannot exceed 50 per cent of the total of approved project costs. This means that if the costs recorded in the project accounts are lower than budgeted, the Research Council’s disbursement will be reduced so that it will not exceed 50 per cent of the project costs. 

This funding is intended to contribute to covering payroll costs, non-wage labour costs and indirect costs for the research fellow and internal supervisor/mentor, costs at the degree-conferring institution as well as other operating costs in the project. Funding from the Research Council is disbursed as project support to the public entity, not as a grant to the candidate. 

Funding for Research Stays Abroad 

Public entities that are awarded funding under the Public Sector PhD Scheme may also seek support for a research stay abroad for their doctoral candidate provided that the candidate is associated with a degree-conferring institution in Norway. See the separate Research Council call for proposals Funding for Research Stays Abroad for Doctoral and Postdoctoral Fellows. 

The Project Owner (public sector body) is responsible for selecting the archiving solution(s) to use for storing research data generated during the project. The Project Owner must specify the planned solution(s) in connection with the revised grant proposal. 

Special requirements and guidelines relating to the form and content of the grant application 

• The formal roles of project administrator and project manager are to be held by employees of the Project Owner and not by the doctoral candidate. 
  • The project administrator must be authorised to represent and sign on behalf of the Project Owner in connection with the Public Sector PhD project. The project administrator must approve the application prior to submission and must sign documents such as the contract. 
  • The project manager is the contact person for the Research Council. 
• Partners: Remember to list the degree-conferring institution and any other participating public entities or institutions as partners. The applicant (public sector body) and the Research Council are not to be listed as partners. 
• Main activities and milestones in the project period are to include: 
  • required and elective courses to be taken at the degree-conferring institution and any other university/university college; 
  • a midterm evaluation at the degree-conferring institution; 
  • milestones for the planned scientific articles; 
  • completion of the candidate’s doctoral dissertation as the final milestone. The completion of the doctoral dissertation is considered to be completion of the project. The Research Council does not wait for the applicant’s dissertation defence since this may take a lengthy time. 
• In the specification field for the Cost plan you are to describe how you have arrived at the hourly rates for project participants and to indicate how many hours per year have been calculated per project participant.  
• Starting from 2024, a new requirement for project progress assessment has been introduced. To ensure a consistent and thorough follow-up, it is mandatory to conduct two progress meetings annually. These meetings are expected to include representatives from the project-leading organization (project manager and/or administrative personnel and internal supervisor), the degree-granting institution (primary supervisor), and the Ph.D. candidate. As part of this new procedure, meeting minutes must be submitted to the Research Council no later than 14 days after the meeting. The meetings are designed to assess the project's development, address any challenges in the early stages, and ensure continuous communication with the Research Council regarding the project's progress. 

Grant applications and all attachments may be submitted in Norwegian or English. 

Attachments to the grant application 

The project description and other mandatory attachments must be completed using the designated template(s). You will find all templates at the bottom of this call for proposals. All attachments must be submitted in PDF format. 

Parts of the application process are automated. For this reason, it is important that you use the templates below and that the header text is kept intact. 

Mandatory attachments when submitting the application form 

1. a project description 
2. a CV for the candidate: In the Public Sector PhD Scheme, we do not have our own template for CV, please use a "common" CV layout 
3. information about the partners 
4. confirmation of participation in a doctoral project (to be uploaded under the attachment type "Other")

Other attachments 

5. For applications for ICT security and cryptology only: confirmation of security clearance and authorisation (to be uploaded under the attachment type "Other").

Applications that do not meet the requirements will be rejected.  
Applications that have not included mandatory attachments no. 1–4 will be rejected. 

All attachments to the application must be submitted together with the application. We do not accept attachments submitted after the application has been submitted unless we have requested additional documentation. 

Please do not attach any documents other than those requested. Links in the application form or project description to websites and documents, as well as other attachments than those specified above, will not be included in the application review process. 

There is no technical validation of the content of the attachments you upload, so please make sure that you upload the correct file for the selected type of attachment. 

Applications for this call are administratively processed by the Research Council.Due to the limited budget, we expect more applications than there are available funds. Processing of applications will therefore take place through the following steps: 

• You can apply from 24 January to 6 March before 1:00 p.m., after which the call will be closed for applications. 
• The sequence in which applications are processed is decided by means of randomisation (lottery draw). 
• The applications will then be processed in the order of the draw until the available budget has been allocated. 

Within eight weeks after the deadline (6 March), the Public Body will receive feedback regarding either a conditional approval of funding or rejection. Processing may take longer during holiday periods or if a very large number of applications have been received. Applicants will be notified via "My RCN Web". 

If the application is conditionally approved, applicants will receive a letter requesting additional information and revision of the grant application. The applicant will be asked to submit a revised grant application with a popular science summary presentation of the project as well as provide any clarifications or updates required. 

Usually, the deadline for submitting the revised application is three weeks. Applicants may request an extension of this if necessary. 

When requested additional information and application revisions has been approved for funding, we will issue a contract that can be accessed via "My RCN Web". The signed collaboration agreement with the degree-conferring institution and, if applicable, other partners must be uploaded as attachments to the contract. The contract enters into force after the Research Council has approved the submitted contract document and the attachment. The contract becomes valid after we have finally approved the submitted contract and attachment.