[en] At the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe the characteristics of an accelerator-driven systems (ADS) are critically evaluated, mainly with respect to the potential of transmutation of minor actinides and long-lived fission products, to the feasibility and to safety aspects. One main component of an ADS is the spallation target, which mainly consists of a beam window separating the evacuated proton beam pipe from the heavy liquid metal spallation area. The beam window is exposed to a high radiation and thermal field. Thus, cooling of the beam window is considered as one of the most critical issues in designing a spallation target. In spite of many proposals worldwide for liquid metal target designs, most work on beam window cooling remains in the stage of theoretical investigations. To go the first step into the practice, two liquid lead-bismuth targets of 1 MW beam power are designed and fabricated within two different projects: ISTC 559 at the Institute of Physics and Power Engineering (IPPE) Russia, and MEGAPIE at the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) Switzerland. This 1999 progress report, describes: - Experimental results achieved at the HYTAS test facility for the ISTC 559 project, - a design study of the Karlsruhe 4 MW spallation target K4T which can be implemented in the FZK Three-Beam Concept, - the outline of the MEGAPIE Initiative the objective of which is to run a 1 MW liquid metal target in 2004 in the SINQ Accelerator Facility at PSI, - the objectives of the European Benchmark Working Group and a typical numerical result on the cooling of an ADS relevant beam window. (orig.)