Instructions and Template	
For Base4NFDI Basic Service Proposals 
-	Initialisation Phase - 

Version 3.1
2024-06-03	
I	A. General Instructions
The proposal template provides a mandatory structure and a number of tables to be completed. Apart from that, applicants are free to decide how to present the content. All sections of text in grey are intended to provide guidance for completing the proposal and should be deleted in your proposal submission. 
Base4NFDI provides consultation and support during the initial application phase and throughout the three project phases. To make use of these options and consider them in your Service concept, contact us via base4nfdi-servicestewards@lists.nfdi.de.    
Proposals for Base4NFDI Basic Services must be submitted via the spokesperson of the NFDI Section supporting the proposal to base4nfdi-office@lists.nfdi.de in PDF format. This implies that the proposal has been presented and discussed in a Section meeting and was met with approval.
Further information about the next submission deadline and the entire evaluation process can be found at the Base4NFDI website, which will be updated continuously., Proposals must be written in A4 format, 11 pt Arial font with line spacing of 1.5. The length of the proposal may vary depending on the complexity of the proposed service but may not exceed 15 pages (excluding cover page, financial tables of chapter 6 and appendix). A different font or line spacing may be used in tables, figures, footnotes and the list of references, provided the text is still easy to read. The proposal and appendices are to be written in English. Please use the proposal template contained in part B of this form.
The requested funding amounts should not include programme allowances (for indirect project costs). Budgeted allowances will come from Base4NFDI flex funds and vary by the phase (initialisation, integration, ramping up for operation) for which funding is requested. Funding for the Initialisation Phase    – with the exception of well-argued cases – will be limited to one year and a maximum of €226.500.
For further information please refer to https://base4nfdi.de or contact Base4NFDI base4nfdi-office@lists.nfdi.de in the case that answers are not available online.
Changes to version 2 of this document (2023-04-20) are highlighted with grey background colour. Change notes can be found on base4nfdi.de. Please remove all remaining background highlighting for the final proposal. 
II	
B. Proposal Template - Initialisation Phase

1.	General Information
•	Name of proposed Basic Service (in English)
•	Acronym of the proposed Basic Service
•	Service "subtitle" explaining key functionality 
•	Corresponding NFDI Section
•	Lead institution
The lead institution is the coordinating institute for the Basic Service for the current stage of development. 
Please enter the institute’s name and address.
•	Name of lead institution principal investigator
The primary contact and coordinator of the Basic Service.
Please enter the name and email address.
•	Participating institutions

Principal Investigator	Institution, location	Contact E-mail	Member in [consortium]	Funding requested
[yes | no]	
					
Table 1: List of participating institutions
List all participating institutions. If applicable, make clear if there are partner institutions without funding. 
•	Planned duration of the project
The initialisation phase typically runs 1 year, under well-justified and well-explained circumstances up to 2 years. If the planned duration is longer than 1 year, please provide a justification here.
•	Significance
Explain the intended added value of your service in max. 120 words. Try to use non-technical vocabulary and explain your proposal to an undergraduate-educate scientist / consortia member outside your field of specialty.
•	Summary of the proposal in English and German
up to 1,500 characters each, including spaces
2.	
State-of-the-Art of Proposed Basic Service (max 3 pages)
Background and Motivation
Briefly explain the added value provided through an NFDI-wide Basic Service of the here proposed type. Briefly sketch how a Basic Service would look like and / or how its details would be shaped during the initialisation phase. Please also briefly provide a rationale, why you think the proposed service can be defined as a Basic Service with regards to the Base4NFDI service definition. If feasible and applicable, do also briefly add from your overall perspective: how will the proposed service possibly interact with other (basic) services, what does it need?

State-of-the-art

Status of work results in preparation for the Basic Service
(Keywords: Preliminary identified requirements and needs (on what basis evaluated?), functional/operational gaps - Robustness, security and scalability of intended technologies - Building on existing technologies/infrastructure - Open licence technology - Coordination and integration of existing standards, conflicting standards/implementations - Necessity of further development or new development - Alternatives - Connection to existing consortia: Which consortia currently support the development of the service? Should also motivate the development phase overview in sections 4.2 - 4.4 … )
Current Technical Readiness Level (TRL) of the proposed Basic Service (max 0.5 pages)
Briefly specify the current TRL for the proposed Basic Service (based on existing work). 
The following definitions apply: 
●	TRL 1 – basic principles observed
●	TRL 2 – technology concept formulated
●	TRL 3 – experimental proof of concept
●	TRL 4 – technology validated in lab
●	TRL 5 – technology validated in relevant environment (industrially relevant environment in the case of key enabling technologies)
●	TRL 6 – technology demonstrated in relevant environment (industrially relevant environment in the case of key enabling technologies)
●	TRL 7 – system prototype demonstration in operational environment
●	TRL 8 – system complete and qualified
●	TRL 9 – actual system proven in an operational environment (competitive manufacturing in the case of key enabling technologies; or in space).

For non-technical services, please provide analogous information.
3.	
SWOT Analysis (max 2 pages)
Please detail strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats for the proposed service in the table below and provide an explanation and transparent reflection on opportunities and risks, plans to overcome weaknesses and strengthen opportunities. Focus is on the one hand the intended service and its characteristics, on the other hand the analysis of the environment for the acceptance of the service in the NFDI and beyond. Please consider different perspectives, e.g., end users, consortia, international stakeholders.
Internal	Strengths
1.
2.
3.
…	Weaknesses
1.
2.
3.
….	
External	Opportunities
1.
2.
3.
….	Threats
1.
2.
3.
…	
Table 2: SWOT analysis

4.	Working Concept for the Development of the Basic Service (max 2.5 pages)
Describe the overall concept for the development of the Basic Service with regard to all stages (Initialisation, Integration, Ramping up for Operation). As this proposal is for the initialisation phase, describe it in more detail. Include in particular how requirements and use cases across all consortia are going to be captured.
Service initialisation concept
Describe how a prototype of the Basic Service is going to be introduced as a proof of concept into the evolving infrastructure, e.g., landscape reviews, identification of relevant stakeholders within consortia, requirements collection, consortium-specific as well as overarching analysis, gap analysis, exchange with sections, alignment of (user) personas, benefits (“what is in it for me”) and use cases. Initial definitions of training and outreach target groups, goals and rough content (“terminal learning objectives”). In particular, a working prototype and a proof of concept would mean that the service as a whole has reached TRL5-6 which must be reflected by the respective project deliverables given below (section 5).

Development and integration outlook
Explain the development and integration work required to establish the Basic Service for different NFDI consortia, e.g., required work for interfaces with other existing IT solutions (see 4.1), adaptations to standards, creation & dissemination of training and further development to meet specific requirements. 

Ramping up for Operation
Explain the requirements that have to be achieved to scale the service to a larger user group including hardware needs, operational overheads, estimates for compute power and continuous maintenance, roll-out of training to a wider audience, further measures for adoption and (user) support. The Basic Service may be accessible through a central site (central operations) or in a distributed way (e.g., operations through individual NFDI consortia). Make an effort to explain your own estimates. 

Risks and challenges
Give an overview on the risks and challenges that may occur through operations of the service on behalf of the initialisation, integration or ramp-up phase. 
5.	
Work Programme (ca. 6 pages)
This section should describe the structure of your work programme for the initialisation phase as it relates to the overall objectives of the proposed Basic Service. 
Overview of work packages
The work programme for the initialisation phase of a Basic Service is divided into different work packages, deliverables, and milestones. Please include all institutions working together on a work package (as a unified project group) and name the institution, who leads the work package. 
Be aware that there are five mandatory deliverables from Task Area 1 (Base4NFDI), three of them with regard to your documentation of the initialisation phase: a summary of your requirements analysis, an overview of your software evaluation and the documentation of your software service design (due 3/6/6 months resp. after start); also providing the Basic Service as a prototype and testing it with selected users are mandatory deliverables (see TA1’s actions in section Measure 1.4 of the Base4NFDI proposal (D1.4.1-D1.4.5) and contact the Base4NFDI team for more detailed information). Additionally, a matrix of contact persons or stakeholders across all consortia is considered a significant outcome in preparation for the integration phase. During this phase you should already be thinking about key performance indicators that can be applied in the integration phase.
We further recommend a work package on community engagement and communication to allocate resources to, for example, the realisation but also participation in workshops. We recommend to allocate resources to 
●	Centrally coordinated activities and offers by Base4NFDI, like a kickoff event, a monthly Jour Fixe with Base4NFDI and the other service teams, quarterly consulting regarding training with a focus on target group and learning goal definition special workshops e.g., on personas, …
●	The organisation of two or more community workshops during the duration of the initialisation phase
●	Participation in consortia activities and conferences
●	Giving a lecture for the NFDITalk series

Note that deliverables are tangible outcomes of the work (software, documents, plans, designs, training materials,...), while milestones are specific moments in time or in the course of the project. Here, the achievement of the goals (i.e. deliverables) of one of the development phases and the transition to the next phase is considered a milestone. 
Work package	Deliverables (D) and 
milestones (M)	Responsible partner	
1.	content 	D1.1 
D1.2 
M1.1 
…	institution	
2.	other content	D2.1 
D2.2 
M2.1 
…	some other institution	
…	…	…	
Table 3: Overall work programme with work packages, deliverables, milestones, and responsible partners.

Detailed work programme
Please provide a detailed description of the work packages, using one subsubsection per work package. Please include a Gantt chart summarising the duration, dependencies, deliverables and milestones of the WPs. 
5.2.1 WP1
5.2.2 WP2
5.2.3 WP3

6.	Funding Request
List the task area in the table heading and the individual work packages in the table. Add additional lines as necessary.
	Year 1	Year 2 
(if applicable)	Total
in €	
Work Package 1				
Work Package 2				
Work Package 3				
…				
Total project funds 				
Table 4: Funding request by work package

List the name of each institution, adding additional lines if necessary.
	Year 1	Year 2 
(if applicable)	Total
in €	
Institution	Totals in €			
Lead institution				
Participating institution 1				
Participating institution 2				
Participating institution 3				
…				
Total project funds 				
Table 5: Funding request by institution

Please note the current staff funding rates of the DFG at the time of application, only on this basis funding is possible. In addition, please keep in mind the maximum budget that can be requested in the initialisation phase (cf. Section I A).
Any proposed instrumentation funding must be explained separately below the table.
	Year 1	Year 2 
(if applicable)	Total
in €	
DFG Funding category	Totals in €			
Staff				
Direct project costs				
Total project funds				
Table 6: Funding request by funding category
List the number of person months for which funding is requested under the given staff categories of the DFG Personnel Rates.
	Year 1	Year 2 (if applicable)	
Staff category	Number of person months	Number of person months	
Postdoctoral researchers
and comparable
			
Doctoral researchers
and comparable
			
Other research assistant			
…			
Table 7: Funding request by staff category

7.	Required Support Actions from Base4NFDI, NFDI Sections and NFDI Consortia (max 1 page)
Please add additional support you explicitly need from the Sections, from Base4NFDI or from single consortia or any other support.   An example is shown in the table.
Support from	Work package	Contact person Basic Service	
Base4NFDI	Support in setting up questionnaire for requirement analysis	Lara Musterman, Musterinstitut, lara.musterman@musterinstitut.de	
Section Metadata		max.mustermann@blabalabl.de	
…			
Table 8: Support request

On the following page you will find a template to confirm the accuracy of the information provided in this application (Principal Investigator) as well as the commitment of all participating institutions (institute directors) listed in section "1 General information". You can reproduce the template accordingly.

We herewith certify that we have submitted this proposal to Base4NFDI and that the information provided therein is accurate. 

Head of the lead / participating institution

____________________________			__________________________________
First name last name				      		City, date, signature

Principal investigator
____________________________			__________________________________
First name last name				      		City, date, signature
III	Appendix
The appendix may only include the following information and documents: 
a)	Bibliography and list of references
Please list all sources and data repositories, information infrastructures and software that you have used to describe the status quo in your proposal. Indicate which sources were written or developed by members of the participating institutions (for example, by highlighting the source in bold). 
b)	Letters of commitment (LoC) supporting the Basic Service development (cf. section 7 of this form)
It is standard for project partners to commit to the project activities. Partners are named in the paragraph "general information - participating institutions" of this template. Letters of commitment (LoC) are requested only in two cases: 1) from an NFDI consortium if it dedicates consortium funds for specific contributions to the service, 2) from other persons or institutions that may not actively participate but contribute to the service in any form. 
LoCs can be submitted two weeks after the application deadline.
Please do not provide generic consortia support letters. General support including the approval of 25% of the NFDI consortia will be requested in a separate process by the Base4NFDI coordination team. 

All signed documents must be sent by the corresponding section by email to the Base4NFDI Coordination (base4nfdi-office@lists.nfdi.de) in a PDF by the date of the decision round this proposal is seeking.