Grants
Grants that get funded.
Tailored grant-writing service, quoted per brief. Methodology grounded in the published research on what separates funded from unfunded proposals — not consultant intuition. Three tiers from Letter-of-Intent to multi-aim program grant.
Scoping brief in 1 business day. Delivered in 5–25 business days per tier — committed in your SOW.
Methodology
What the research says wins grants
Six findings from peer-reviewed studies of grant-review behaviour. Each one shapes where we spend the package effort.
Specific Aims is the highest-leverage page
Reviewers form an initial impression in the first 5 minutes of contact with a proposal — almost always while reading Specific Aims (NIH study-section reviewer-time analyses, Berkman 2018; Spillman 2022). We allocate roughly a third of total package effort to this single page across multiple rewrite passes.
Significance + Innovation outweigh Approach on first-pass scoring
NIH 9-point scoring data shows the Significance and Innovation sub-scores correlate more strongly with funding outcome than Approach for the first-pass cut, even though Approach gets more page count (Eblen et al. 2016; NIH OER data). We weight our drafting effort accordingly.
Preliminary data correlates strongly with funded outcomes
Across NIH, NSF, ARC, and Wellcome competitive schemes, proposals with non-trivial preliminary data are funded at materially higher rates than those without (multiple agency self-reviews). We help you surface and structure what you already have — pilot results, prior publications, unpublished figures — so the reviewer sees feasibility, not aspiration.
Match the funder's strategic-priorities language
Reviewers anchor on alignment with stated funder priorities. Mining the funder's recently-awarded grants in your domain (NIH RePORTER, NSF Awards, ARC Data Portal) surfaces the phrasing and framing that signals fit. Every package starts with a 1–3 page funder brief built from this analysis.
Write for the lay reviewer in the second tier
Most major funders place at least one non-specialist on the panel. Plain-English abstracts and lay summaries are scored separately and propagate the proposal's framing to the decision discussion. We draft these to grade-12 readability without sacrificing technical accuracy.
Realistic, line-itemed budgets win
Under-budgeted proposals look naive; over-budgeted ones look greedy. Reviewers cross-reference budgets against the aims to test feasibility. We draft a budget narrative that justifies each line against the work it funds, calibrated to your funder's award-size distribution.
Deliverables
Every package includes
The Specific Aims page, refined
Multiple rewrite passes against the funder's exact format. Tight, hypothesis-driven, written to survive the 5-minute first-pass read.
Funder-pattern-matched narrative
We mine recently funded grants in your domain from the funder's public award database. The language patterns + framing get baked into your draft.
Budget + biosketches
Line-itemed budget with justification narrative. Biosketches reformatted to current funder format (NIH biosketch, NSF biographical sketch, ARC ROPE).
Reviewer simulation
Before you submit, we run the draft through independent critique passes (rigor, fundability, plain-language). You see the top risks and fix them at home.
Letter-of-support templates
Draft language for each collaborator letter you'll need. You secure signatures; we save you the cold-start writing time.
Compliance check report
Programmatic verification of page count, font, margins, citation format, embedded figures, every CFP-defined requirement. No format-violation desk rejections.
Who this is for
Three researchers we land hardest with
If you recognise yourself here, the methodology and tier pricing below were designed with you in mind — not the ten-person grants office at a top-50 R1 university.
Early-career PI · solo or 1–2 staff
Competing against labs with full-time grant writers
You're an assistant professor or solo PI without a senior mentor to red-pen drafts and without an institutional grants office to do the first pass. Other applicants have both.
Fits:Standard package — 11 business days, Specific Aims through 3-pass refinement, plus reviewer simulation before you submit.
Established PI · 3+ active grants
No time to write the next R01 from scratch
You have the science. What you don't have is the 80–120 hours needed to draft the next R01 while running an active lab. Your time is better spent on supervision and grant strategy.
Fits:Major package — 25 business days, multi-aim coordination across 25–50 pages, 5-pass refinement, you supervise + sign off.
Industry researcher · biotech / startup / corporate R&D
Academic-grant format is foreign territory
You're applying for ARC Linkage, NHMRC partnership, SBIR/STTR, or another government scheme. Your work is strong, but the academic-grant format and reviewer culture are unfamiliar.
Fits:Standard or Major — we translate industry rigour into funder vocabulary; reviewer simulation flags what an academic panel will probe.
Scope
Three complexity bands. Quote per brief.
Tier is matched to grant complexity, not your institution's size. Pricing scoped against the funder, the page count, and the work that specific grant requires — we send a fixed quote within one business day of your enquiry, before any work starts.
Seed / LOI
Delivered in 5 business days
Quote on enquiry
≤$50k requested
Fits: Letter of Intent, pre-proposal, small foundation grant, pilot grant
- Specific Aims / Project Summary page
- Brief narrative
- Plain-English abstract
- Light budget + justification
- Compliance check
- 1 revision round
Standard
Delivered in 11 business days
Quote on enquiry
$50k–$500k requested
Fits: NIH R03 / R21, NSF Standard, ARC Discovery Indigenous, NHMRC Ideas, mid-size foundation
- Full Specific Aims (3-pass refined)
- Significance + Innovation + Approach narrative
- Plain-English abstract
- Budget + justification narrative
- Biosketches reformatted
- Letter-of-support templates
- Reviewer simulation (3 passes)
- Compliance check
- 1 revision round
Major
Delivered in 25 business days
Quote on enquiry
$500k+ requested
Fits: NIH R01, NSF CAREER, ARC Linkage / Discovery, NHMRC Investigator, Wellcome Discovery, ERC, multi-PI program
- Full Specific Aims (5-pass refined)
- Multi-aim narrative coordination
- Program management plan
- Plain-English abstract
- Multi-year budget + justification
- All biosketches reformatted
- Multiple letter-of-support templates
- Reviewer simulation (5 passes)
- Compliance check
- 2 revision rounds
Resubmission credit
If unfunded, 50% of the quoted fee credited toward a resubmission package using the reviewer feedback.
Follow-on credit
25–30% of the quoted fee credited toward your next grant with us within 90 days.
No success fees
We never take a percentage of awarded funds. Fixed quote per brief, paid up front, full stop.
You own everything
Full IP assignment on delivery. Your name on the grant, no Empirica byline required. No embargo on reuse.
7-day refund window
Unhappy with the first deliverable? Full refund within 7 days, minus any third-party data costs. No questions.
24-hour response
Every email gets a reply or status update within 24 hours on business days. Critical when you're on a funder deadline.
Full version with all ten sections (scope, IP, refund mechanics, confidentiality, payment, what we don't do, termination, governing law) at /services-terms →
Why this is worth what we charge
For a typical $500k NIH R01 grant, hiring us puts you about $13,582 ahead on average — for a $6,500 package. Every scenario we tested came out ahead.
The math on grant writing is unusually clean: what we charge is small compared to the size of the grant, so even a small bump in your chances of winning translates to a big expected dollar return. We've used the low end of published research throughout to stay honest.
| Option | Cost |
|---|---|
| Empirica Standard grant package | $4,500–$8,500 (fixed price) |
| Hire a freelance grant writer | $75–$200/hr — typically ~$3,750–$10,000 for a grant this size |
| You write it yourself (cost of your time) | ~100 hours × $150–$300/hr = $15,000–$30,000 |
| A boutique academic-grant consultancy | $15,000–$50,000 |
Coverage
Funders we know best
Where we've mined the funder's recently-awarded grant database and built up pattern libraries. Not on this list? Ask — we evaluate fit before saying yes.
- NIH (R01, R21, R03, K-awards)
- NSF (CAREER, Standard, EAGER)
- DOD CDMRP
- NASA (ROSES)
- DARPA (BAAs)
- ARC (Discovery, Linkage, DECRA, Future Fellowships)
- NHMRC (Ideas, Investigator, Synergy)
- MRFF
- Cancer Council
- UKRI (BBSRC, EPSRC, MRC, ESRC)
- Wellcome (Discovery, Career Awards)
- ERC (Starting, Consolidator, Advanced)
- Horizon Europe
- Leverhulme
- Gates Foundation
- Open Philanthropy
- Templeton
- Simons Foundation
- Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
- Sloan Foundation
Request
Request a grant package
Tell us the funder, the call, the deadline, and the rough specific aim. We'll reply within one business day with the scoping brief, the recommended tier, a fixed quote, and a Stripe invoice link if you want to proceed.
Who you'll work with
Charles O'Connor
Founder & Chief Executive Officer
“Good research is built from creativity, breadth, and empathetic learning from others.”Meet the team
Empirica Digest
Not ready to commission a grant package?
Get the weekly digest — Sunday morning Melbourne time. Includes occasional notes on grant-writing patterns we surface from the funder databases. Free. Cancel any time.
Unsubscribe any time. No third-party sharing.