Tennessee · Nonprofit
UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION
UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION (Tennessee) receives grants from 5 organizations whose IRS filings report $300,771 to it, the largest being Trustees of Tufts College ($138,958). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $8.5M
- Funders on record
- 5
- Grants received
- $301k
- Net assets
- $88M
What University of Tennessee Research Foundation does
Mission
Promoted, encouraged, and aided scientific, social and/or educational investigation and research by assisting the marketing of technologies.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Promoted, encouraged, and aided scientific, social and/or educational investigation and research by assissting the marketing of technologies.
$9,841,562 spent$10,377,183 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $9,841,562.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2022 to 2023, from $83M to $94M (+14%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 53% · 2018 22% · 2019 39% · 2020 37% · 2021 22% · 2022 22% · 2023 20% · 2024 15% · 2025 31%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Who funds it, year by year
2020 → 2023: the base narrowed from 3 funders to 1 funder, grant income rose $38k → $78k.
1 of 5 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 17% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION’s funders (the co-funder graph). Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION leans on a few funders — its largest provides 46% of grant income and the top three 93%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
100% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2020 68% · 2021 61% · 2022 100% · 2023 100% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Where its funders are
UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION draws 94% of its grant income from funders outside Tennessee, across 4 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $51k arriving through sponsors registered in 1 state is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Government funding UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $2.1M on record.
- Department of Agriculture$2.1M
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Tennessee
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
100% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
88%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 6 related entities
- Cherokee Farm Development Corp · exempt
- Collaborative Composit Solution · exempt
- Clinical Trial Network of Tennessee · exempt
- Cherokee Farm Properties Inc · corp_trust
- Tennera LLC · corp_trust
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION?
- UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION (Tennessee) receives grants from 5 organizations whose IRS filings report $300,771 to it, the largest being Trustees of Tufts College ($138,958). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION have?
- IRS filings report 5 organizations giving $300,771 in grants to UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION, 4 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION?
- Trustees of Tufts College is the largest funder on record, with $138,958 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RESEARCH FOUNDATION find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Tennessee. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds University of Tennessee Research →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 5 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing