Supervisor-search readiness
Research and PhD files need a Swiss letter of support. This is a planning tool, not an official SBFI decision.
This is a planning tool, not an official SBFI decision. Files without a named Swiss supervisor are not considered.
You find the professor. FCS will not.
Every research fellowship and PhD application needs a Swiss academic supervisor who endorses the project and writes a letter of support. FCS is blunt: the applicant is responsible for the search. The ESKAS secretariat will not match you. Swiss universities will not run a placement service for this scholarship. The search can take weeks or months because professors already receive a pile of nearly identical emails.
Suitable supervisors are professors and laboratory group leaders. For a PhD, the person must be authorised to supervise doctoral theses. At a university of applied sciences, a doctorate needs two supervisors, and one of them must be authorised to confer doctorates at a traditional university.
The scholarship application (including that letter) and admission to a doctoral programme are two separate procedures. A kind email from a professor is not matriculation.
Where to look
Start from the host list SBFI publishes, then read group pages — not the rectorate inbox. Real public sites include:
Applied-science and arts hosts are also on the official list (HES-SO, BFH, FHNW, OST, FHGR, HSLU, SUPSI, ZHAW, ZHdK, and others). Confirm the current list on SBFI.
Before you write
- Academic fit. The professor should already work in your field. A generic “Dear Professor, I admire your university” email is noise.
- Self-assessment. Check degree requirements for the collaboration you want. If the group only takes people with a specific method or language, say so to yourself before you waste their time.
- One host, one proposal. Multiple simultaneous applications or more than one research proposal are exclusions.
What to send with the first email
FCS tells applicants to be specific: introduce your studies, say you will apply for this scholarship, and attach at least:
Name two or three of their recent papers. Propose a project that can live in their lab. Ask for a conversation, not a signature in the first sentence.
What the letter of support must do
Support is voluntary and it is a real commitment: the professor should know the project, have discussed it, and be ready to host you for 12 months (research stay) or up to 36 months (PhD). FCS asks Swiss professors to support only one or two candidates a year. The letter should sit on official letterhead and include:
- A description of the research project
- The relationship to the candidate
- Potential future collaboration
- A short CV of the supervisor (maximum 2 pages)
The supervisor is expected to integrate you into the group and provide working conditions (lab, desk, infrastructure). If a PhD runs longer than the fellowship, FCS expects the host to help with further funding for the remaining year or two.
Doctoral schools are a special trap
If year one of the school does not assign a supervisor, you still need both the school's admission letter and a support letter. If the school will not let you contact a supervisor before admission, FCS says an application for this scholarship is not possible on that path. You can start the school without the award and try the next cycle — but the one-year-already-in-Switzerland exclusion still applies. Not every university has a doctoral school (Fribourg is the official example of one that does not).