# Mandatory machine-readable portfolio reporting for all large cancer funders

Source: https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-fund-cross-funder-portfolio-registry/  
OnCo record `idea-fund-cross-funder-portfolio-registry` (Idea). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Every funder that spends more than $50 million a year on cancer research would publish what it funds in a shared, coded database, so gaps and duplication can be seen across the whole system.

## Summary

The International Cancer Research Partnership already codes members' portfolios by cancer type and Common Scientific Outline category, but participation is voluntary and misses most industry-funded academic work, Chinese funders and a large part of European funding. Governments and umbrella bodies would require reporting as a condition of charitable tax status or public co-funding, with a common ontology, award-level data and outputs linked (publications, trials, patents). Coverage is what turns a nice database into a planning tool.

## Fields

- Kind: Idea
- Last checked: 2026-09-08
- Hypothesis: Raising portfolio-registry coverage above 80% of global non-industry cancer research spend enables at least three documented cases per year where funders reallocate or co-fund to fill identified gaps or eliminate duplication.
- Rationale: Coded portfolio analysis has already exposed funding imbalances in the UK and US; the missing piece is coverage and enforcement. Clinical trial registration went from voluntary and patchy to near-universal once journals and regulators made it mandatory.
- Proposed test: One country mandates reporting for two years; measure coverage, the number of gap analyses produced and documented reallocation decisions citing the registry.
- Maturity: speculative
- Actor: data

## Sources

- International Cancer Research Partnership: https://www.icrpartnership.org/

## Connected records

- ideas: [A public dashboard of research money per death for every cancer](https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-fund-dollars-per-death-dashboard/), [Burden-weighted portfolio targets for every major cancer funder](https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-fund-burden-weighted-portfolio/)
- institutions: [Cancer Research UK](https://onco.cc/institutions/cruk/), [German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ)](https://onco.cc/institutions/dkfz/), [National Cancer Institute (NIH)](https://onco.cc/institutions/nci/)
- bottlenecks: [Data silos](https://onco.cc/bottlenecks/b-data-silos/), [Funding follows fashion, not burden](https://onco.cc/bottlenecks/b-funding-allocation/)

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