What SFARI does

SFARI is the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative, a non-profit scientific research initiative founded in 2003 and housed within the Simons Foundation in New York. It is the only program within the Simons Foundation dedicated to autism science, and its stated mission is to advance the basic science of autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders. SFARI operates two flagship data platforms — SFARI Gene, a curated database of genes implicated in autism susceptibility, and SFARI Base, a data and biospecimen access portal — alongside four major human cohorts (SPARK with 400,000+ participants, Simons Searchlight, the Simons Simplex Collection at ~3,000 families, and the Autism Inpatient Collection at 1,500+ children), model organism repositories (iPS cells, mouse, rat, zebrafish), the Autism BrainNet postmortem tissue network, the Research Match recontact service, the Simons Sleep Project for wearable-based phenotyping, and open-source data analysis tools.

The organization's business model is non-commercial philanthropy: SFARI does not sell products or services. It disburses funding through individual investigator grants, collaborative grants, and early career awards — including the 2026-launched New Ideas Award (up to $600,000 over two years) — via the Simons Award Manager portal, and it distributes curated research resources to approved investigators. All operating funding comes from the Simons Foundation. SFARI's GTM motion is therefore a funding- and resource-allocation model rather than a sales motion: it markets funding opportunities and resources through its website, newsletter, workshops (e.g., the 2026 quantitative behavioral phenotyping series), investigator meetings, and cross-promotion through other Simons Foundation programs.

SFARI's customer base spans academic researchers (primary), industry investigators from biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies working on autism-related target identification and drug discovery (secondary), and patient advocacy groups representing rare genetic variants linked to autism (tertiary). The initiative is led by Kelsey C. Martin, M.D., Ph.D., Executive Vice President of Autism and Neuroscience, who joined in 2021 from UCLA. SFARI's geographic scope is global with a stated exclusion of institutions in China and Hong Kong from funding eligibility.

Name

SFARI

Legal name

The Simons Foundation, Inc.

Website

https://sfari.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2003

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

SFARI is a non-profit scientific initiative of the Simons Foundation that funds autism and neurodevelopmental research worldwide and operates curated data platforms (SFARI Gene, SFARI Base), major patient cohorts, and model organism repositories serving academic, industry, and patient advocacy researchers.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

New York

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Others, Technology or R&D, Operations, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Philanthropic Funding: SFARI is funded by the Simons Foundation. As a research initiative, it does not generate commercial revenue but distributes funding through grants to autism researchers worldwide.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

SFARI advances the basic science of autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders by funding researchers through individual investigator grants, collaborative grants, and early career awards, and by providing shared data platforms (SFARI Gene, SFARI Base), curated autism cohorts (SPARK, Simons Searchlight, Simons Simplex Collection, Autism Inpatient Collection), biospecimens, and research models to qualified investigators worldwide.

Product overview

SFARI (Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative) is a research initiative and not a traditional software product company. Its core offerings consist of data platforms and research resources designed to advance autism science. The main products are SFARI Base (data access platform for approved researchers) and SFARI Gene (gene database for autism research), supplemented by four major autism cohorts (SPARK, Simons Searchlight, Simons Simplex Collection, and Autism Inpatient Collection), multiple model systems (iPS cells, mouse, rat, and zebrafish), data analysis tools, and the Simons Sleep Project. SFARI also provides access to Autism BrainNet for postmortem brain tissue and the Research Match service for participant recruitment. SFARI supports over 300 investigators worldwide through various funding mechanisms including individual investigator grants, collaborative grants, and the New Ideas Award for exploratory research.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• SFARI Base

Quantifiable outcome

• Over 600 investigators supported since 2003
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers2 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration1 record

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Ten partnerships are on record, tiered major, core and minor.

• Patient Advocacy Groups (17 supported organizations)majorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 15 June 2026SFARI funds conferences organized by patient advocacy groups within the Simons Searchlight community, including MEF2C Foundation, Yellow Brick Road Project, GRI-UK, DYRK1A Syndrome, HNRNP Family Foundation, GRIN2B Foundation, Coffin-Siris Syndrome Foundation, FamilieSCN2A Foundation, CHAMP1 Research Foundation, Koolen-de Vries Syndrome Foundation, and others. Also provides 16 travel awards for researchers to attend these conferences.
• SPARK (Simons Foundation Powering Autism Research)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerSPARK is the world's largest autism research study, collecting genetic and behavioral data from over 400,000 individuals with autism and family members. SFARI provides funding and resources for this cohort.
• Simons SearchlightcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerInternational research program that collects genetic, medical, and behavioral data from individuals with genetic variants linked to autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders.
• Simons Simplex CollectioncoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerContains rigorously characterized genetic and phenotypic data from nearly 3,000 families with one child affected by autism.
• Autism BrainNetcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaborative network of academic sites that collects, stores, and distributes postmortem brain tissue for autism research.
• Autism Inpatient CollectionmajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerHouses genotypic and phenotypic data from more than 1,500 children with autism who were admitted to in-patient child psychiatry units.
• SFARI InvestigatorscoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerOver 300 investigators worldwide supported through various funding mechanisms including individual investigator grants, collaborative grants, and early career awards.
• Research MatchmajorTechnology or IntegrationService enabling approved researchers to recontact participants from SFARI autism cohorts (SPARK, Simons Searchlight, Simons Simplex Collection) for recruitment into new research studies.
• Simons Collaboration on Plasticity and the Aging BrainminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerPart of the Neuroscience Collaborations under the Autism and Neuroscience division of the Simons Foundation along with SFARI.
• Simons Collaboration on the Global Brain (SCGB)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerPart of the Neuroscience Collaborations. Aims to expand understanding of the role of internal brain processes in cognition.

Scale indicators5 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Autism Speaks: The largest autism-focused nonprofit, funding research, providing resources, and advocating for individuals with autism. Directly comparable to SFARI as a major nonprofit funder and resource provider for the autism research community, though with a broader advocacy mandate.
• Autism Science Foundation: A nonprofit that funds autism research and provides science-based information to families. Comparable to SFARI as a focused autism research funder, though smaller in scale and without SFARI's large-scale cohort and biospecimen infrastructure.
• Allen Institute for Brain Science: A nonprofit research organization that generates large-scale, open-access brain science datasets and resources. Comparable to SFARI in operating as a nonprofit that builds foundational, community-shared scientific infrastructure — including atlases, models, and open data platforms.
• Brain & Behavior Research Foundation: A nonprofit that funds research across mental health, including autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders. Comparable to SFARI as a research-grant-making nonprofit that supports individual investigators and early-career scientists, though with a broader psychiatric scope.

Broad incumbents

• National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH): The largest U.S. public funder of mental health and autism research, supporting investigator-initiated grants, large-scale cohorts, and research resources. Comparable as a major institutional funder of autism science but with vastly larger scale and government-driven mandate.
• Howard Hughes Medical Institute: A major biomedical research organization that funds investigators and operates research campuses. Comparable to SFARI as a private, mission-driven science funder with substantial independent resources, though operating at a far larger scale across all of biomedicine.
• Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (Rare Disease & Neuroscience): A philanthropic organization that funds biomedical research including rare disease and neuroscience, operating open-science platforms such as the Cell Science program. Comparable as a large private foundation funding open-science biomedical infrastructure, with growing overlap in rare-disease neurodevelopment.

Emerging players

• International Society for Autism Research (INSAR): A professional society that hosts the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) and supports the global autism research community. Comparable to SFARI as a convener of the autism research ecosystem, though operating as a membership society rather than a grant-making entity.
• International Rett Syndrome Foundation: A nonprofit focused on accelerating research and treatments for Rett syndrome, a genetic neurodevelopmental disorder closely linked to SFARI's Simons Searchlight cohort. Comparable as a disease-focused research funder supporting genetics-driven neurodevelopmental research.
• TSC Alliance: A nonprofit that funds and supports research into Tuberous Sclerosis Complex, a genetic condition with high autism comorbidity. Comparable as a patient-advocacy-driven funder of genetics-based neurodevelopmental research with associated cohort and biospecimen programs.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/sfari

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about SFARI