Submission Terms & Privacy Notice

1.1This document sets out the terms on which Alternative Circle Limited (the “Recipient”), through the contact form available at https://alternativecircle.com/contact (the “Contact Form”), receives messages, ideas, proposals and other content from members of the public (“Submitters”), and the terms on which personal data submitted via the Contact Form is collected, processed and stored.

1.2The Recipient operates the website alternativecircle.com. For the purposes of data protection law, Alternative Circle Limited is the data controller of Personal Data collected via the Contact Form.

1.3By ticking the consent box on the Contact Form and submitting it, the Submitter accepts these Submission Terms and consents to the Personal Data processing described in this Privacy Notice. If the Submitter does not agree, they should not submit the Contact Form.

2.1“Alternative Circle” means Alternative Circle Limited, a company incorporated in Kenya, including its subsidiaries, affiliates, directors, officers, employees, agents and ventures (including, without limitation, Shika, Oye, and Dhahabu).

2.2“Applicable Law” means the Data Protection Act, No. 24 of 2019 (Kenya); the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (“GDPR”) to the extent applicable; and any other laws applicable to the processing of Personal Data by Alternative Circle.

2.3“Consent” has the meaning given to it under Applicable Law.

2.4“Contact Form” means the contact form available at https://alternativecircle.com/contact.

2.5“Personal Data” has the meaning given to it under the Data Protection Act, 2019 and the GDPR — broadly, any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person.

2.6“Processing” has the meaning given to it under the Data Protection Act, 2019.

2.7“Recipient” means Alternative Circle Limited.

2.8“Submission” means any message, idea, proposal, business plan, pitch, concept, suggestion, intellectual property, or any other content submitted via the Contact Form, including but not limited to the Submitter’s name, email address, topic selection and message text.

2.9“Submitter” means the natural or legal person submitting a Submission via the Contact Form.

3.1The Submitter acknowledges and agrees that any Submission made via the Contact Form is provided on a non-confidential, non-proprietary basis. The Recipient is under no obligation to treat any Submission as confidential.

3.2No confidential relationship, fiduciary duty, partnership, joint venture, agency, or employment relationship is created between the Recipient and the Submitter by virtue of any Submission.

3.3The Submitter shall not submit any information that the Submitter regards as confidential, proprietary, or trade secret. If the Submitter wishes to share confidential information, the Submitter must request and execute a written non-disclosure agreement with the Recipient prior to such disclosure.

4.1The Recipient has no obligation to read, review, evaluate, respond to, acknowledge receipt of, retain, or act upon any Submission. The Recipient may, in its sole discretion, choose to engage with, ignore, delete, or otherwise dispose of any Submission without notice or liability.

4.2No promise, representation, or warranty by the Recipient — whether to consider, develop, fund, invest in, partner with, mentor, employ, or otherwise engage with the Submitter or any Submission — shall be implied by any Submission or by any reply (or lack thereof).

5.1The Submitter acknowledges that the Recipient and Alternative Circle (and its ventures, partners, and affiliates) are continuously engaged in identifying, evaluating, developing, investing in, and operating business ventures, products, services, and ideas across a wide range of sectors, including but not limited to digital finance, mobility, commodities, agriculture, media, policy, and consumer technology.

5.2The Submitter further acknowledges that the Recipient and Alternative Circle may at any time, before or after a Submission is made, be developing, considering, working on, or already engaged in ventures, products, services, or ideas that are similar to, identical to, or competitive with the subject matter of a Submission, without any reference to or reliance on the Submission.

5.3Nothing in a Submission shall be construed to (a) restrict, limit, or impair the right of the Recipient or Alternative Circle to independently develop, acquire, invest in, partner on, or operate any business venture, product, service, or idea, whether or not similar to the Submission; or (b) entitle the Submitter to any compensation, equity, credit, royalty, license fee, partnership, or other consideration in respect of any such venture, product, service, or idea.

5.4The Submitter waives any claim, demand, action, or right of action against the Recipient or Alternative Circle arising from or related to the Recipient’s or Alternative Circle’s pursuit of any business venture, product, service, or idea, whether or not similar to a Submission, in the absence of a separately executed, written agreement signed by an authorised representative of the Recipient or Alternative Circle.

6.1To the extent any Submission contains material in which the Submitter holds or may hold intellectual property rights, the Submitter grants to the Recipient and Alternative Circle a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, sub-licensable and transferable licence to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, display, distribute, and create derivative works from the Submission, in any form and for any purpose, without compensation or attribution to the Submitter.

6.2The Submitter represents and warrants that: (a) the Submitter has all rights, permissions, and authority necessary to make the Submission and to grant the licence described in clause 6.1; (b) the Submission does not infringe upon, misappropriate, or violate any intellectual property right, privacy right, publicity right, contractual right, or other right of any third party; (c) the Submission is not unlawful, defamatory, obscene, threatening, harassing, or otherwise objectionable; and (d) the Submission does not contain any malicious code, software, or other harmful content.

6.3The Submitter shall indemnify and hold harmless the Recipient and Alternative Circle from and against any claim, loss, damage, liability, cost, or expense (including reasonable legal fees) arising from or related to any breach of the representations and warranties in clause 6.2.

7.1The data controller in respect of Personal Data collected via the Contact Form is Alternative Circle Limited, of 7th Floor, The Address, Westlands Workstyle Offices, Nairobi, Kenya, a company incorporated under the laws of Kenya.

7.2Enquiries about the processing of Personal Data, or to exercise data subject rights, may be addressed to: kevin.mutiso@alternativecircle.com.

8.1When a Submitter completes the Contact Form, the following Personal Data is collected: (a) name; (b) email address; (c) topic of enquiry (a categorisation selected by the Submitter); and (d) message content.

8.2The Contact Form does not request, and the Submitter is not required to provide, any special categories of Personal Data (such as health data, race, ethnicity, religious beliefs, political opinions, sexual orientation, or biometric data). The Submitter should not include such categories in the Submission.

9.1The Personal Data is processed for the following purposes: (a) to enable the Recipient to receive, read, evaluate, and (where the Recipient elects) respond to the Submission; (b) to maintain records of communications received via the Contact Form; (c) to detect, prevent and investigate fraud, spam, abuse, and security incidents; and (d) to comply with legal obligations.

9.2The lawful basis for processing is: (a) the Submitter’s Consent (Section 30, Data Protection Act, 2019; Article 6(1)(a), GDPR), evidenced by ticking the consent box and submitting the Contact Form; and (b) to the extent applicable, the legitimate interests of the Recipient and Alternative Circle in receiving, evaluating, and securely managing enquiries (Section 30, Data Protection Act, 2019; Article 6(1)(f), GDPR).

10.1The Personal Data is processed via the following third-party service providers, acting as data processors on behalf of Alternative Circle: (a) Netlify, Inc., a Delaware corporation based in the United States, which provides website hosting and form submission infrastructure for alternativecircle.com; (b) Google LLC, a Delaware corporation based in the United States, which provides reCAPTCHA spam-prevention services and (where enabled) Google Analytics website-analytics services; and (c) any email service provider used by the Recipient to receive notifications of Contact Form submissions (currently a Google email service).

10.2The Personal Data is not sold, licensed, traded, or otherwise transferred to any third party for marketing or commercial purposes.

11.1Where enabled, alternativecircle.com uses Google Analytics to understand aggregate, non-identifying usage of the website (such as pages viewed and general location). This may involve cookies or similar technologies set by Google. The Submitter may decline or clear these via their browser settings without affecting use of the Contact Form.

11.2Google reCAPTCHA is used on the Contact Form to distinguish humans from automated abuse; its use is subject to Google’s privacy policy and terms.

12.1The Submitter acknowledges that the service providers identified in clause 10.1 are located outside Kenya, primarily in the United States. The submission of the Contact Form therefore involves the transfer of Personal Data outside Kenya.

12.2Such cross-border transfer is necessary to provide the service requested by the Submitter (i.e., the operation of the Contact Form) and is conducted in reliance on appropriate safeguards offered by the service providers and on the Submitter’s Consent.

13.1The Personal Data will be retained: (a) within the Netlify form submission inbox for the period reasonably necessary to evaluate, action, and respond to the Submission, and thereafter for such period as may be required under the Data Protection Act, 2019 and any other Applicable Law; and (b) within the Recipient’s email service, as part of normal email correspondence, in line with the Recipient’s general email retention practices.

13.2The Submitter may at any time request the deletion of Personal Data held in connection with their Submission (subject to any overriding legal or regulatory retention obligations).

14.1Where Applicable Law confers rights upon the Submitter, including (without limitation) Sections 26 and 40 of the Data Protection Act, 2019 and Chapter III of the GDPR, the Submitter has the right to: (a) access the Personal Data held about the Submitter; (b) request rectification of inaccurate Personal Data; (c) request erasure of Personal Data (“right to be forgotten”); (d) object to or restrict processing; (e) withdraw Consent at any time, without affecting the lawfulness of processing carried out prior to withdrawal; (f) receive a copy of the Personal Data in a structured, commonly-used, machine-readable format (“data portability”); and (g) lodge a complaint with the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner of Kenya (odpc.go.ke) or, for EU/EEA residents, the relevant national data protection authority.

14.2To exercise any of these rights, the Submitter may contact kevin.mutiso@alternativecircle.com.

15.1Alternative Circle takes reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect Personal Data against unauthorised access, alteration, disclosure, or destruction. These measures include reliance on the security infrastructure of the service providers identified in clause 10.1 (which provide industry-standard encryption in transit and at rest) and on internal access controls.

15.2No transmission of data over the internet can be guaranteed to be fully secure, and the Submitter acknowledges this inherent risk.

16.1The Recipient may revise these Submission Terms and Privacy Notice from time to time. Any revised version will be posted at https://alternativecircle.com/submission-terms with an updated effective date. Material changes will, where reasonably practicable, be communicated to recent Submitters by email.

17.1These Submission Terms and Privacy Notice are governed by the laws of Kenya.

17.2Any dispute arising out of or in connection with these Submission Terms shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of Kenya.

18.1If any provision of these Submission Terms and Privacy Notice is held to be unenforceable, the remaining provisions shall continue in full force and effect.