Who sponsors SMC?

Sponsors in science, business, the media and society support SMC with donations and grants as well as Friends and Sponsors’ membership fees.

As many sponsors as possible who give as much as possible: This is how we want to guarantee that SMC has enough resources to establish itself, extend its portfolio of topics and secure its long-term future.

As many areas as possible in which our sponsors are to be found: This is how we want to guarantee that SMC can act independently and reflect the diversity of actors who constitute successful science journalism.

This is why we pursue a multi-funder policy.

We actively seek sponsors in the following areas:

specialist societies

research institutes

media enterprises

public bodies and ministries

private individuals

foundations

universities

associations

businesses

science organisations.

As a rule, the amount any one sponsor can donate is capped at 50,000 euros or five per cent of SMC’s annual budget.

Exceptions include the Klaus Tschira Foundation which facilitated the creation of SMC as a non-profit organisation in June 2015 with seed funding of 1.5 million euros. In April 2019, three years after the first SMC story was sent out, the Klaus Tschira Foundation committed to supporting the SMC in the long term with an annual amount of 750,000 euros. In 2020, the annual funding was increased to 1,000,000 euros. In 2022, the Klaus Tschira Foundation has pledged annual funding of 1,500,000 euros for five years.

Further exceptions include publicly-funded grants such as project-related third-party funding from the Federal Ministry of Research, which allow us to create temporary positions for software developers or scientific staff in the SMC Lab.

Sponsorship can be granted in the form of donation to SMC directly or membership of the "Association of Friends and Sponsors of the Science Media Center Germany gGmbH". Sponsors will be sent a charitable donation receipt for tax purposes.

Recent sponsors

Klaus Tschira Stiftung (1,5 Mio. Euro)

10.001 Euro - 20.000 Euro

BASF

Bayer Science & Education Foundation

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft

5.001 Euro - 10.000 Euro

Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina

Industrieverband Körperpflege- und Waschmittel

Janssen-Cilag

Karlsruher Institut für Technologie

RWTH Aachen

Süddeutsche Zeitung

Universität Heidelberg

2.001 Euro - 5.000 Euro

Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg

Covestro Deutschland

Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum (DKFZ)

Deutsches Lackinstitut

dpa Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Elsevier

Forschungszentrum Jülich

Freie Universität Berlin

Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam, GeoForschungsZentrum (GFZ)

HIT Umwelt- und Naturschutz Stiftung-GmbH

Leibniz-Gemeinschaft

Max-Delbrück-Centrum für Molekulare Medizin (MDC)

Polit-X Hauptstädtische Verlags-GmbH

Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

Spektrum der Wissenschaft

Technische Universität München (TUM)

Uniklinik Köln

Universität zu Köln

up to 2.000 Euro

Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung

Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen

Einstein Stiftung Berlin

Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena

Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker (GDCh)

Johanna-Quandt-Stiftung

Technische Universität Braunschweig

Technische Universität Darmstadt

Funding projects

100.001 Euro bis 250.000 Euro

Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (SMC Lab-Projektförderung: Augmented Science Journalism und SciCon-Vortragsreihe)

50.001 bis 100.000 Euro

Eva Mayr-Stihl Stiftung (SMC Lab-Projektförderung: Bridging the Communication Gap)

20.001 bis 50.000 Euro

WPK Innovationsfonds (SMC Lab-Projektförderung: Public Issues Data Guide)

Further individual donations

Spenden: 1.361,05 Euro

(Stand: Dezember 2023)

Funders of the past years

Das Science Media Center Germany bedankt sich bei allen Fördernden.

Unsere Fördernden der vergangenen Jahre haben wir hier zusammengefasst:
2016; 2017; 2018; 2019, 2020, 2021 und 2022.