D2XCEL Privacy Policy

1. Who we are:

D2XCEL establishes and deploys a sustainable scaling platform, acting as catalyst to strengthen the effectiveness and efficiency of the existing European startup ecosystem to support deep tech and digital ventures successfully provide market-ready applications,

flourish, grow strongly and increase the market footprint of European deep tech Startups and scaleups that contribute substantially to the sustainability and European sovereignty of key sectors such as Transport, logistics & trade and adjacent areas of Smart Cities (mobility, utilities, sustainable construction). D2XCEL supports the existing startup ecosystem actors with state-of-the-art methodologies, best practices, tools and especially pan-European networks. These will be developed and deployed in a program with 100 selected high potential ventures, assuring both direct impact on the success of those ventures as well as hands-on experience of the ecosystem actors.

D2XCEL brings together a wide, multidisciplinary and balanced consortium composed of 12 partners. The consortium has been designed to leverage the partners large networks (investors, corporates, customers, supporters, and scale-up ecosystems, etc), and their reputation and demonstrated experience assets built over many successful years to help deep tech companies unlock their potential. The consortium not only has an extensive project track record, a wide network reach (covering all of Europe and beyond), a deep understanding of deep tech companies’ growth challenges, but also complementary resources, capacity and recognized expertise at global level and strong ties and access to many corporates, investors and business partners needed to deliver the best support programme to the selected companies.

Tech Tour is the largest tech entrepreneurship and investment community in Europe. It engages the most promising tech entrepreneurs selected by the most active investment experts to raise funding and grow through smart partnerships and strategies in collaborative programmes leading up to events.

Maritime Street are strategic supervisors and advisors, empowering governments in emerging and developing countries to initiate, design and implement digital trade policy frameworks. With a strong track record in implementing public-private collaborations, Maritime Street has developed unrivaled strategic expertise across the port, customs, foreign trade, maritime and logistics industries.

Zaz Ventures supports deep tech ventures in the most critical journey of their company lifetime, from post-seed to Series A/B, when scale-up activities will finally commence. As a market-leading consultancy for EIC Accelerator funding, ZAZ has raised more than EUR600m+ in over 160 companies over the past eight years.

Aalto University School of Business, Finland participates with its Center for Knowledge and Innovation Research CKIR founded in 1999 as an academic and multidisciplinary research center at the university. CKIR’s main research focus is on innovation ecosystems, ICT-enabled service platforms and thus enabling new business dynamics.

Miles Ahead is a venture studio and fund focused on AI and Deeptech software start-ups. It provides support to early-stage start-ups in the areas of go-to-market, product strategy, management, financing and all other relevant challenges for companies that are in the seed-stage.

The Recursive is the largest online media focused on the emerging tech and startup ecosystems in Central and Eastern Europe. REC provides industry-agnostic reporting, news and analysis, to give international visibility to the regional innovation systems and their active stakeholders (founders, investors, supporting organisations and policymakers).

The Athens University of Economics and Business with its Athens Center of Entrepreneurship and Innovation - ACEin (ACE), the University’s incubation center. Since 2014 when ACEin was created, close to 90 teams were incubated in its premises and received business direction and active support, coaching and mentoring.

Corporate Venture Advisory provides advisory to global high-tech and sustainability ventures, corporations and investors on cooperation, securing lead customers, fundraising, internationalisation, deal flow and (IPR) strategies. CVA supports ventures from EU, USA, Asia in finding cross-border European lead customers, securing early and growth funding.

BRYCK is the new innovation hub and future factory at the heart of the Ruhr area, Germany's industrial centre and biggest metropolitan region. It creates a space & and network for aspiring founders, growing startups, progressive scientists, accelerating investors, corporate innovators, hubs, accelerators, startup programs.

NürnbergMesse is one of the 15 largest exhibition companies in the world. It organises trade fairs at the Nuremberg Exhibition Centre and worldwide in fields that include Building & Construction, Electronics & Security, Process Technology, Retail & Consumer Goods, and Social & Public.

UNIMOS Foundation is a non-governmental business support organization specialized in orchestrating crossindustry, cross-border and cross-sectoral network collaboration and alliances, cluster management, knowledge transfer and cross-industry innovations.

AnyChange is an organization specialised in change-management. It uses the scientifically based Z-model fo Change® and various tools to measure change in organizations. It also provides a network of specialised business and start-up coaches.

2. How we collect your personal data

We collect personal data both directly and indirectly:

Directly. We obtain personal data directly from individuals in a variety of ways, including but not limited to the following cases:

an individual submits application data for the programme;
an individual registers to attend in meetings and events we host and during attendance at such events;
we establish cooperative relationships with an individual;
we provide professional services pursuant to our contract with the European Commission;
an individual participates in an interview or survey or any other activity organized by us.

Indirectly. We obtain personal data indirectly about individuals from a variety of sources, including:

our research partners;
our networks and contacts;
public and open data sources such as public registers, news articles and internet searches;
social and professional networking sites (e.g., LinkedIn).

3. What types of data we collect?

We only collect the data that are necessary for the smooth implementation of our project. These data fall into the following categories:

contact details (name/surname, e-mail address, street address, mobile phone number, land line phone number);
professional information (job title, organization, field of expertise);
demographics (e.g. nationality);
information about what a person knows or believes;
videos and photos (from people that attend our events).

4. Bases of lawful processing

We process personal data on the following legal bases:

Legal obligations – for processing activities required for compliance both with applicable national and European legislation as well as with the specific legal and regulatory framework of the Horizon Europe Framework Programme for Research and Innovation of the European Union.
Consent – for processing activities such as organization of surveys and interviews, completing of questionnaires and dissemination of project’s results.
Contractual obligations – for processing activities such as reporting to the European Commission and complying with project’s publicity obligations.

5. What we do with your personal data

We process your personal data with the purpose of:

Conducting research (e.g., interviews, surveys);
Disseminating our project’s results to different types of stakeholders;
Sending invitations and providing access to guests attending our events and webinars and taking part in our activities;
Administering, maintaining, and ensuring the security of our information systems, applications, and websites;
Processing online requests or queries, including responding to communications from individuals;
Complying with contractual, legal, and regulatory obligations.

We continuously apply a personal data risk assessment process to identify, analyse, and evaluate the security risks that may threat your personal data. Based on the results of this risk assessment, we define and apply a set of both technical and organizational measures to mitigate the above security risks, including but not limited to:

Data Protection Policies to guide our personnel when processing your data;
Written contracts with organizations that process personal data on our behalf;
Non-Disclosure Agreements with our personnel;
Back up process, antimalware protection, access control mechanisms, etc.
Processing online requests or queries, including responding to communications from individuals;
Some of our partners have appointed a Data Protection Officer.

We may occasionally share personal data with trusted third parties to help us deliver efficient and quality services and provide additional benefits. When we do so, we ensure that recipients are contractually bound to safeguard the data we entrust to them before we share the data. We may engage with several or all the following categories of recipients:

Parties that support us as we provide our services (e.g., cloud-based software services such as Dropbox, Microsoft SharePoint, Google);
Our professional advisers, including lawyers, auditors, and insurers;
Our partners and sponsors;
Law enforcement or other government and regulatory agencies or other third parties as required by, and in accordance with applicable law or regulation;
The European Commission according to our relevant contractual obligations.

We do not own file servers located outside the European Economic Area (EEA). However, some partners may use cloud and/or marketing services from reputable providers such as SharePoint, Dropbox, Mailchimp, Google, etc., situated both inside and outside the EEA. We always check that such providers comply with the relevant GDPR requirements before start using their services.

6. Cookies and privacy

Cookies are short text files stored on a user’s device (such as a computer, tablet or phone) by a website. Cookies are used for the technical functioning of a website or for gathering statistics.

Cookies are also typically used to provide a more personalised experience for a user for example, when an online service remembers your user profile without you having to login.

When you visit our website, we may collect some data on your browsing experience such as your IP address, the website page you visited, when you visited and the website page you were redirected from.

This information is used to gather aggregated and anonymous statistics with a view to improving our services and to enhance your user experience. When you visit this website, we will keep the browser history of your visit for a maximum of 13 months . This information will then be deleted.

Should you wish to opt your data out of our anonymised, aggregated statistics, you clean the cookies for this website from your browser. Read our cookies information for more information about the types of cookies this website uses.

We use cookies on our website for its technical functioning and for gathering statistics. A cookie is a small piece of data that a website stores on the visitor’s computer or mobile device. The table on this page lists the cookies that this website uses and describes their purpose.

We use HubSpot's traffic analytics tool to view website traffic data. This includes viewing traffic by source, topic cluster, device type, country, and more. These analytics measure website traffic metrics like the total number of visits, unique visitors, page views, bounce rate, session duration, and more. These metrics help understand how our website is performing.

You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser. However, we point out that if you do this, you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website.

7. Your rights

You have the following rights regarding our processing of your personal data:

Right to withdraw consent – You can withdraw consent that you have previously given to one or more specified purposes to process your personal data. This will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent.
Right of access – You can ask us to verify whether we are processing personal data about you and, if so, to have access to a copy of such data.
Right to rectification and erasure – You can ask us to correct our records if you believe they contain incorrect or incomplete information about you or ask us to erase your personal data after you withdraw your consent to processing or when we no longer need it for the purpose it was originally collected.
Right to restriction of processing – You can ask us to temporarily restrict our processing of your personal data if you contest the accuracy of your personal data, prefer to restrict its use rather than having us erase it, or need us to preserve it for you to establish, exercise or defend a legal claim. A temporary restriction may apply while verifying whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to process it. You can ask us to inform you before we lift that temporary processing restriction.
Right to data portability – In some circumstances, where you have provided personal data to us, you can ask us to transmit that personal data (in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format) directly to another entity.
Right to object – You can object to our use of your personal data for direct marketing purposes, including profiling or where processing has taken the form of automated decision-making. However, we may need to keep some minimal information (e.g., e-mail address) to comply with your request to cease marketing to you.
Right to make a complaint to your local Data Protection Authority (DPA) (see https://ec.europa.eu/justice/article-29/structure/data-protection authorities/index_en.htm) regarding any concerns you may have about our data handling practices.

To ask us to do anything of the above, you can use the contact form on our website. We will promptly examine your request against the relevant requirements of the laws and regulations governing privacy and personal data protection and we will answer the latest within 30 days after receiving your request. We will ask from you some kind of identification (e.g., photocopy of your identity card or passport) to avoid non-authorized reveal of your personal data. If, for reasons of complexity of the request or a multitude of requests, we are unable to respond promptly, we will notify you within 30 days of any delay, which in no case may exceed two months from the expiration of the 30-day deadline.

8. How long do we retain personal data?

We retain personal data to provide our services, stay in contact with you and to comply with applicable laws, regulations, and contractual obligations to which we are subject. Please note that we have an obligation to retain data concerning projects funded by the Horizon Europe Framework Programme for Research and Innovation of the European Union for up to five years after the end of the project (unless further retention is requested by auditors). After the expiry of the retention period, and unless further legitimate grounds for retention arise, we will dispose of personal data in a secure manner.

9. Disclaimer of liability for third-party websites

Although our site may contain links to third-party sites, including the sites of the consortium partners, we are not responsible for the privacy practices or content of these sites and we expressly disclaim any liability for any loss or damage that may be caused by the use of these links. We do not monitor the privacy practices or the content of these sites. If you have any questions about the privacy practices of another site, you should contact the site's responsible personnel. We suggest you read the privacy policy of each website you interact with, before allowing the collection and use of your personal data.

We may also provide social media features that allow you to share information on your social networks and interact with our project on various social media sites. The use of these social media features may result in the collection or sharing of information about you. We recommend that you check the privacy policies and regulations of the social networking sites you interact with, so that you can be sure that you understand what information may be collected, used and disclosed by these sites.

10. Revisions of this Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy is valid from 15/02/2024 and replaces any other previous notifications that we had issued in the past regarding our personal data management practices. We reserve the right to revise this Policy at any time. The current version will be always uploaded to our website indicating the date of entry into force, so you know when the most recent revision took place. If there are critical changes in this policy or our personal data practices change significantly in the future, we will notify you by posting the changes on our website.