The Technology Agency of the Czech Republic has announced the fifteenth public competition in the SIGMA Program for the Support of Applied Research and Innovation – Sub-objective 3 – Support for the Innovative Potential of Social Sciences, Humanities, and Arts. The SIGMA – DC3 public competition is focused on supporting project proposals that strengthen the social sciences, humanities, and arts (SHUV) in applied research and innovation activities and apply the outputs of these activities in the form of new or significantly improved products, procedures, processes, or services.

All conditions and a description of the competition can be found in the tender documentation, which is available on the TAČR website. Four main themes have been set for this competition, which the project proposal must address. More information on this condition can be found in this document.

• Please note that projects for SIGMA DC3 must be submitted in Czech only.
• We kindly ask all interested parties to inform the Project Support Department as soon as possible, no later than February 11, 2026, if they are interested in submitting a project proposal.
• Project proposals will be submitted via the new TAČR SISTA portal, which can be accessed using your citizen ID or bank ID. After creating an account, you will need to request a link to the university account from a colleague at RMU who manages the university account. We cannot arrange this step within the Faculty of Arts, as TAČR views MU as a whole, and therefore there are no separate faculty accounts. Detailed information can be found in the TAČR instructions.
• If you know that the topic of your project may touch on ethics, it is necessary to inform the Ethics Committee for Research, specifically Mgr. Veronika Smítková, as soon as possible. The deadline for submitting applications is strictly set at 2:00 p.m. on 23th February 2026. Further information on this step can be found on the Commission's website.
• The Central Library offers assistance in ensuring compliance with the principles of open science and in preparing a data management plan (DMP). If you are interested, please contact openscience@phil.muni.cz. When preparing project proposals, do this before setting personnel costs, as it may be necessary to define the position of data steward.
• We strongly recommend contacting the Technology Transfer Center (CTT), specifically Ms. Hana Půstová, for consultation on the results, their applicability, and intellectual property requirements. If your project involves the commercialization of results or the division of ownership of results among partners, consultation with the CTT is mandatory. This is a workplace with many years of experience with applied results and their protection.
• For a project proposal to be successfully submitted, it must undergo a process of internal checks:
  Human Resources Department: by March 3, 2026 (Ing. Marie Čadová, Bc. Kamila Hojačová).
  Finance Department: by March 6, 2026 (Michaela Jedličková Svobodová).
  The internal deadline for the final check before sending to the Project Support Department is set for March 10, 2026 (Dr. Libor Zajíc, Marie Skřivanová).

The competition deadline is March 18, 2026.

An informational online webinar by the provider on this competition will take place on January 28 at 10:00 a.m. on the TA ČR YouTube channel. No prior registration is required. Participation is highly recommended.