The University Of British Columbia

The University Of British Columbia, operating as Research Services, is a Canadian public research university that serves as a prime recipient of federal grants and a subrecipient on federally funded research programs, with a substantial footprint in biomedical and geological research. UBC is a tax-exempt educational institution and operates without SBA designations; it competes in full-and-open procurements and is not eligible for set-aside programs. Headquarters are in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with research facilities and performance sites distributed across multiple North American locations including Ottawa, Ontario; Spokane, Washington; Baltimore, Maryland; and Boston, Massachusetts.

UBC's federal footprint centers on two capability areas: specialized biomedical and translational research, and advanced geological sample analysis. On the biomedical side, UBC receives prime grants from the Defense Health Agency under the Military Medical Research and Development program (CFDA 12.420) for translational research spanning spinal cord injury, cancer immunotherapy, neuromodulation, and traumatic brain injury. Recent prime grants include $5.74 million over four years for translational research on brain injury and strangulation in intimate partner violence survivors (awarded September 2025), $1.868 million for cardiocentric hemodynamic management of acute cervical spinal cord injury (September 2025), and $2.498 million for blood biomarkers in intimate partner violence survivors (June 2024). UBC also holds prime grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse supporting youth overdose prevention toolkit development ($1.156 million, awarded September 2024 under CFDA 93.113) and drug checking program evaluation ($1.726 million, awarded September 2021). For geological services, UBC provides radiogenic isotope analysis and zircon analyses to the U.S. Geological Survey and National Institutes of Health under smaller purchase orders, including a $206.14 thousand USGS contract for volcanic sample radiogenic isotope analysis (August 2022) and a $24.93 thousand USGS purchase order for strontium, neodymium, lead, and hafnium isotope analysis (September 2024), with the latter awarded as sole source reflecting UBC's data continuity and methodological continuity on analytical work.

UBC's customer concentration is heavily weighted toward the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Defense Health Agency. The top-four funding agencies account for 47 percent of awards: the Department of Health and Human Services NIH serves 49 awards, the Defense Health Agency funds 34 awards, the NIH National Institute on Aging funds 31 awards, and the NIH National Cancer Institute funds 16 awards. Dollar concentration diverges; the CDC Pittsburgh channel and CDC Office of Acquisition Services combined represent 98 percent of UBC's combined potential value at $31 million across 12 awards, driven by awards valued in the low single-digit millions. UBC serves 54 distinct federal customer agencies across prime and sub work, reflecting its position as a research-services partner across federal health, defense, geological, and scientific portfolios. The university competes for grants rather than contracts; it holds no government-wide acquisition contracts or parent vehicle seats in the traditional sense.

UBC's subrecipient footprint spans dozens of prime grantees, reflecting deep integration into the U.S. federal research ecosystem. Named prime grantees include The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania (multiple awards spanning Alzheimer's disease, epigenetic analyses, and brain biomarkers), Columbia University (epigenetic DNA methylation analyses), Yale University (DNA methylation research), the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (endometriosis tissue acquisition and genomic analysis), Duke University (autism and anxiety disorder phenotyping in preschool children, digoxin pharmacodynamics), Washington University (DIAN trials for dominantly inherited Alzheimer's disease, spinal cord injury research), and numerous others. UBC's sub-award work centers on epigenetic profiling and DNA methylation analysis—particularly genome-wide DNA methylation using Illumina Infinium arrays, often led by Dr. Michael Kobor's laboratory—as well as patient recruitment, clinical assessment and data collection, histological analysis, molecular characterization, and specialized analytical services including cryo-EM imaging and proteomics.

Activity has grown substantially: eight awards in 2022, eighteen in 2023, fifty-three in 2024, and thirty-one in 2025, with recent activity representing a mix of new prime grants, continuing grant extensions, and sub-awards. UBC's prime-to-sub split is 68 percent prime awards (208) and 32 percent sub-awards (100). The recompete cliff over the next twenty-four months carries seventeen awards (combined potential value $231 thousand)—a minor exposure relative to the overall portfolio. UBC's categorization by NAICS reflects research-institution posture: colleges, universities, and professional schools (12 awards); testing laboratories and services (7 awards); and scientific and technical consulting services (3 awards). PSC coding centers on special studies and analysis in geology (7 awards), professional support (6 awards), and scientific data analysis (4 awards).