Applications to the Sovereign Tech Fund | March 2023

"...The Sovereign Tech Fund invests in open digital base technologies that are vital to the development of other software or enable digital networking. We invest in projects that benefit and strengthen the open source ecosystem. Examples include libraries for programming languages, package managers, open implementations of communication protocols, administration tools for developers, digital encryption technologies, and more. Our currently funded projects show the range and type of technologies that characterize open digital base technologies. We are currently not looking for user-facing applications, such as messaging apps or file storage services. If this changes, we will announce it here. We only support technologies with societal relevance, i.e. technologies from which a broad public benefits or on which particularly vulnerable groups depend. The public interest in these technologies is not measured solely by the number of users, but also by their criticality in particularly important areas of society. The goal of funding is the self-determined use of digital technologies, as well as security, stability and (technological) diversity. To receive funding from the Sovereign Tech Fund, technologies must be under-supplied or threatened by other circumstances, acute or long-term, such as market consolidation or severe dependencies. The lack of support and resources or technical alternatives places the technologies in a vulnerable state that threatens the existence and sustainability of the project. Applicants must clearly state the extent to which there is underuse or overuse. We understand that these can have different manifestations and causes...."