Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
University A holds the prime NIH R01 award and issues a subaward to University B for the imaging aim.
- Is an instance
A Horizon Europe coordinator beneficiary acts as the prime in the GA, with other beneficiaries as co-recipients.
Counter-examples
Looks similar, but isn't
- Not an instance
A subrecipient is not the prime.
- Not an instance
A vendor under purchase order is not party to the prime award.
Editorial commentary
The prime award holder is the pass-through entity with respect to any subawards. Terms of the prime award flow down to subrecipients as required by sponsor rules. The PI on the prime award is typically the overall project director. Distinctions matter for compliance: only the prime can sign amendments with the sponsor, only the prime is named in the Federal Audit Clearinghouse, and only the prime can request no-cost extensions on the overall award.
Vantage point: the funder-facing relationship
“Prime award” describes the flow-down relationship from the position of direct legal privity with the sponsor. It is the general/US federal usage; Horizon Europe’s closest functional equivalent is the coordinator, though the two are not structurally identical — a Horizon Europe coordinator signs the Grant Agreement on behalf of a consortium of co-equal beneficiaries who are all directly party to that one agreement, whereas a US prime recipient typically stands alone as the pass-through entity, with subrecipients bound only indirectly through the subaward instrument. See subrecipient monitoring for the oversight the prime must perform once a subaward is issued.
Choosing how a subaward is structured
A prime deciding how to fund a subrecipient can generally choose between a cost-reimbursement subaward or a fixed-amount subaward. Under 2 CFR 200.333, a pass-through entity may issue a fixed-amount subaward, with prior written federal-agency approval, up to a per-subaward ceiling of $500,000 — raised from $250,000 in OMB’s April 2024 Uniform Guidance revision, effective for subawards issued on or after 22 April 2024. This figure is secondary-sourced (converging legal-summary mirrors of the current eCFR text); re-verify against ecfr.gov directly before treating it as settled if citing more than roughly a year after this note.
References
- US Office of Management and Budget Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200; NIH Grants Policy Statement on multi-organisation awards.
Also known as
Prime grant · Prime contract · Direct award
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
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