PhD Degrees

Funding a PhD scholarship

Contacts
Research Area - PhD Office

Ca’ Foscari is committed to the exploitation of research results and more generally to their transfer. Alongside consultancy and research activities, special attention is paid to collaborative activities with companies having a high scientific and innovative content, with significant social and cultural impact.

The PhD programme can:

  1. provide innovative and highly qualified expertise on a topic of interest to the organisation or company;
  2. increase companies’ competitiveness via product and process improvement deriving from R&D, innovation and technology transfer;
  3. strengthen local synergies and develop innovative research results.

The University's PhD programmes represent an opportunity for organisations and companies to build a valuable relationship between academic research, the local territory and industry, in order to face present and future challenges with new energy.
 

How to fund a scholarship

Organisations interested in funding a PhD scholarship on a particular research topic shall send to the Director of the Department the relevant PhD programme belongs to the attached Letter of Intent whereby they undertake to fund the three- or four-year scholarship and to sign the relevant agreement.
Once the Department has positively accepted the request, the agreement will be signed and the funded scholarship will be included in the call for admission to the PhD programme.
As regards the next call for admission (41st cycle) for the academic year 2025/2026, all Letters of Intent must be submitted no later than 31 January 2025.

file rtf Letter of intent three-year PhD 92 KB
file rtf Letter of intent four-year PhD 95 KB

Tax relief

Entities funding PhD scholarships benefit from the full deduction of the sum paid out from their overall income, whether as a business or as a private individual, capped according to the amount of taxable income paid. 

IRES taxpayers (such as corporations, commercial and non-commercial entities) may benefit from the deduction from their overall income under Article 1, paragraph 353 et seq. of Law 266/2005). They may obtain a tax saving corresponding to 24% or 12% of the financed amount according to their IRES rate.
IRPEF taxpayers (individuals) may benefit from a deduction from their overall income pursuant to Article 10(1) (l-quater) of Presidential Decree 917/1986. They may obtain a tax saving corresponding to their progressive marginal IRPEF rate plus municipal and regional surtaxes applied to the funding value; in the case of high incomes, the saving may amount to over 45%. 

The most recent Stability Laws have provided for tax relief in the form of a tax credit for companies that, regardless of their legal form, size, economic sector, and accounting regime adopted, make investments in research projects managed by universities or public research bodies. 

The 2022 Budget Law has extended the tax relief for investments in research and development, ecological transition, technological innovation 4.0 and other innovative activities referred to in Article 1, Paragraph 198 et seq. of Law No. 160 of 27 December 2019. This is provided for in Article 1, Paragraph 45 of Law No. 234/2021, which confirms the underlying regulation of the relief by extending the terms and modifying the amount of the tax credit, the rates and the maximum amounts eligible according to the type of investments. The Consolidated Income Tax Act also provides that donations of money made to universities and university foundations be deducted from overall income, unless they are deductible when determining the individual incomes that contribute to it. It also provides for the deductibility, for a total amount not exceeding 2% of the declared business income, of donations made to legal persons carrying out research.

For more information see the page dedicated to tax relief [only ITA]  for natural persons and legal entities.

Some partners

From the 28th cycle (academic year 2012/2013) to today:

Accademia Europea di Bolzano - EURAC
National Cybersecurity Agency
Italian Space Agency
Autorità Portuale di Venezia
Center for the Humanities and Social Change - HSC
Fondazione IntesaSanpaolo ente filantropico
Centro Studi Ricerche Ligabue
Consorzio CINECA
Climate Policy Initiative (CPI)
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - CNR
CRO Aviano
Diocesi Patriarcato di Venezia
Fondazione Cariverona
Fondazione Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici (CMCC)
Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM)
Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia – IIT
Fondazione Studium Generale Marcianum
Generali Business Solutions S.C.p.A.
Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia - INGV
Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e Geofisica Sperimentale - OGS
Istituto Nazione Previdenza Sociale - INPS
The Mints Family Charitable Foundation
ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences