PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THIS SITE
Thank you for visiting gofocal.vc (together with Focal as defined below, the “Site”) which is operated by Startup Stage Limited (“us” or “we”) registered in England and Wales (company number 13961983) with its office at 18a/20 King Street, Maidenhead, Berkshire, United Kingdom, SL6 1EF. These terms and conditions, together with any documents referred to within (the “Terms”) govern the use of our Site. By using our Site, you agree to comply with these Terms.
Our Site allows pre-seed to Series A start-ups and general partners of VC Funds ("Applicants") to apply to pitch at a remote or in-person demo day in front of the world's most esteemed VC funds and certain other Investors ("Focal").
The VC funds and limited partners of VC funds ("Investors") will follow certain selection criteria in order to choose up to 20 successful Applicants to pitch at Focal. Certain companies and individuals may provide sponsorship for Focal’s event ("Sponsors") and will be subject to a separate sponsorship agreement.
Focal is open for anyone to attend, whether in a capacity detailed in the Terms below or as a Sponsor, Investor or spectator (together, "Attendees"). Our Site is open to people globally, however we cannot guarantee that content available on or through our Site is appropriate for use or available in every location.
Reference to "you" in these Terms means any Applicant or Attendee.
To contact us, please email hq@gofocal.vc.
These Terms were last updated on 27 March 2024.
1.1 We are not regulated by the UK Financial Conduct Authority or by any other national regulator. Applicants should therefore be aware that Focal is not operated by us as a forum whereby we arrange deals in investments or make arrangements with a view to investments being made by Investors. Focal merely provides the means by which Applicants are able to communicate with interested Attendees, deliver their pitches to attending Investors and network with like-minded individuals.
1.2 Focal is held on a bi-annual basis where circumstances permit with no regular degree of continuity.
1.3 We do not provide Investors with any proprietary due diligence, investment, or promotional materials on Applicants, and we do not provide (or arrange for the provision of) legal documentation in respect of any fundraising by successful Applicants. We do not advise Investors on the merits of any successful Applicants and/or their pitches delivered at Focal and such Investors are expected to use their own insight and judgement and seek independent advice to the extent they deem necessary to do so.
1.4 We do not receive any commission or other form of reward from either successful Applicants or attending Investors and our only form of income in respect of Focal is from our Sponsors as further detailed above.
1.5 Applicants acknowledge that we are not responsible for acquiring or procuring any minimum number or specific profile of Investors for Focal and furthermore that we do not provide any assurance or guarantee that a successful Applicant who pitches at Focal will later achieve fundraising in respect of their company as a result of Focal.
1.6 As we are an unregulated company, we are not authorised to approve any promotional materials which Applicants choose to distribute as part of their individual pitches at Focal. Applicants acknowledge that it is their sole responsibility to ensure that they inform themselves and observe all applicable laws and regulations of any jurisdiction relevant to them as regards the communication of their promotional materials and to seek independent advice to the extent they are in any doubt.
1.7 In using this Site, you agree that all the activities that we conduct with you (including but not limited to Focal) take place within the United Kingdom, regardless of where you may be physically located at the time you use the Site or otherwise engage with us (again, including but not limited to Focal). This means that you agree that our activities are subject only to the laws of the United Kingdom and not to the laws of any other country in which you may be physically present at any given time, and therefore that any redress you may seek from us must be sought under the laws of England and Wales. However, you agree to comply with all relevant laws and regulations that may apply to your use of the Site in any jurisdiction in which you may be located. Without prejudice to this clause 5.7, , you agree that under no circumstances will you make any claim to the effect that our activities are conducted in, or subject to, the laws of any country other than those of the United Kingdom.
1.8 It is our policy to not permit access to our site (nor accept Applicants) from the following jurisdictions either identified by Financial Action Task Force (on 24 February 2023) as having strategic deficiencies in their AML/CTF regimes and/or are currently subject to UK geographic sanctions 1 : Albania, Barbados, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Democratic Republic of Congo, DPRK, Gibraltar, Guinea, Republic of Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Mali, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Panama, Philippines, Russia (and the Crimea), Senegal, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, United Arab Emirates Venezuela, Yemen and Zimbabwe.
2.1. To take part in Focal, Applicants will be required to complete a registration form, which may request all or some of the following:
2.1.1. information about your fund or company; and
2.1.2. information about what you are looking for.
2.2. Applicants who are funds may also choose to provide a slide deck on your offering as part of the registration.
2.3. Applicants who are companies may be required to provide a slide deck on your offering as part of the registration.
2.4. If you provide a slide deck as part of your registration you will be required to provide your consent to circulate this deck with Investors and Sponsors.
2.5. Applicants' registration forms will be shared with all participating Investors and Sponsors of Focal, a full list of which can be found at gofocal.vc .
2.6. We will review all registration forms that have been properly completed and we shall choose up to 30 successful Applicants to present at Focal’s demo day
2.7. Successful Applicants will be selected on the basis of a number of factors, including but not limited to:
2.7.1. the overall strength of your application, as assessed subjectively by the participating Investors of Focal,
2.7.2. the attractiveness of the business proposal;
2.7.3. the uniqueness and defensibility of the product / service on offer;
2.7.4. the commercial progress made to date and;
2.7.5. Investment thesis & track record;
2.8. We reserve the right not to fill the number of successful Applicant slots if we feel that the applications are not suitable for Focal;
2.9 We reserve the right to publish your company name, company website, personal name and elevator from your application form for a 'Top 100' promotion on during the S24's demo day period via Focal's social media channels.
3.1. All Investors and Sponsors shall have the ability to access, view and share any information or content that you submit to our Site (either directly or via the Typeform application) as part of your application (including any pitch slide decks and related documents).
3.2. Investors and Sponsors shall only access, use and share the information you submit for the purpose of assessing your business proposals and suitability for Focal and their own investment criteria.
3.3. Investors and Sponsors shall have no further obligations of confidentiality in respect of any materials or information you submit to the Site.
4.1. To attend Focal, Attendees may be required to agree to third party terms and conditions including, for example:
4.1.1. any hosting terms of service, if attending the event online; and
4.1.2. any venue terms (and health and safety provisions), if attending the event in person.
4.2. You should ensure that you read and understand these terms. If you do not agree, you may not attend the event.
4.3. All attendees will be automatically added to our newsletter upon registration so we can keep you informed about the Site and upcoming dates for Focal.
4.4. For the avoidance of doubt, Attendees are users of our Site for the purpose of these Terms. This includes removing access to Attendees at our discretion, e.g., for conduct not in-keeping with the spirit of Focal.
4.5. There may be some closed-audience elements to each event hosted by Focal (such as one to one break out rooms for the relevant Applicant and/or Investor(s)). You are not guaranteed any access to these closed-elements and you agree and accept that you may not have access to or view these closed-elements as an audience member.
5.1 We are not regulated by the UK Financial Conduct Authority or by any other national regulator. Applicants should therefore be aware that Focal is not operated by us as a forum whereby we arrange deals in investments or make arrangements with a view to investments being made by Investors. Focal merely provides the means by which Applicants are able to communicate with interested Attendees, deliver their pitches to attending Investors and network with like-minded individuals.
5.2 Focal is held on a bi-annual basis where circumstances permit with no regular degree of continuity.
5.3 We do not provide Investors with any proprietary due diligence, investment, or promotional materials on Applicants, and we do not provide (or arrange for the provision of) legal documentation in respect of any fundraising by successful Applicants. We do not advise Investors on the merits of any successful Applicants and/or their pitches delivered at Focal and such Investors are expected to use their own insight and judgement and seek independent advice to the extent they deem necessary to do so.
5.4 We do not receive any commission or other form of reward from either successful Applicants or attending Investors and our only form of income in respect of Focal is from our Sponsors as further detailed above.
5.5 Applicants acknowledge that we are not responsible for acquiring or procuring any minimum number or specific profile of Investors for Focal and furthermore that we do not provide any assurance or guarantee that a successful Applicant who pitches at Focal will later achieve fundraising in respect of their company as a result of Focal.
5.6 As we are an unregulated company, we are not authorised to approve any promotional materials which Applicants choose to distribute as part of their individual pitches at Focal. Applicants acknowledge that it is their sole responsibility to ensure that they inform themselves and observe all applicable laws and regulations of any jurisdiction relevant to them as regards the communication of their promotional materials and to seek independent advice to the extent they are in any doubt.
5.7 In using this Site, you agree that all the activities that we conduct with you (including but not limited to Focal) take place within the United Kingdom, regardless of where you may be physically located at the time you use the Site or otherwise engage with us (again, including but not limited to Focal). This means that you agree that our activities are subject only to the laws of the United Kingdom and not to the laws of any other country in which you may be physically present at any given time, and therefore that any redress you may seek from us must be sought under the laws of England and Wales. However, you agree to comply with all relevant laws and regulations that may apply to your use of the Site in any jurisdiction in which you may be located. Without prejudice to this clause [14.1], you agree that under no circumstances will you make any claim to the effect that our activities are conducted in, or subject to, the laws of any country other than those of the United Kingdom.
It is our policy to not accept Applicants from the following jurisdictions identified by Financial Action Task Force (on 24 February 2023) as having strategic deficiencies in their AML/CTF regimes: Albania, Barbados, Burkina Faso, Cayman Islands, Democratic Republic of Congo, DPRK, Gibraltar, Haiti, Iran, Jamaica, Jordan, Mali, Mozambique, Myanmar, Panama, Philippines, Senegal, South Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, United, Arab Emirates and Yemen.
6.1. Any content you upload to our Site must be your own or you must have a right to use it. Your content will be considered non-confidential and non-proprietary and you should ensure that you do not upload any sensitive or other confidential information that you do not want to be shared by and between Investors.
6.2. You retain all of your ownership rights in your content, but by providing content to the Site, you are granting us and other users permission to use that content for the purposes that it is provided, including publishing the content on the Site and as otherwise permitted in accordance with these Terms.
6.3. You are solely responsible for securing and backing up your content.
6.4. We also have the right to disclose your identity to any regulator or third party who is claiming that any content posted or uploaded by you to our Site constitutes a violation of their intellectual property rights, or of their right to privacy.
6.5. We have the right to disclose your identity to any third party who is claiming that any content posted or uploaded by you to our Site constitutes a violation of their intellectual property rights, or of their right to privacy.
6.6. We reserve the right, but have no obligation, to reject or remove any content that does not comply with these Terms.
7.1. We permit access to our Site to you on a temporary basis, and we reserve the right to withdraw your access or amend the content we provide on our Site without notice. We will not be liable if for any reason our Site and content is unavailable at any time or for any period.
7.2. From time to time, we may restrict access to some parts of our Site, or our entire Site.
7.3. If you register to attend Focal, we will require some information about yourself. Details of what information will be gathered can be found in the applicable sections below. We will only use your personal information as set out in our privacy policy: gofocal.vc/privacy-cookie-policy.
7.4. Your right to access and use the Site will be terminated immediately if you breach any of these Terms.
8.1 We are the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights in our Site, and in the material published on it. Those works are subject to copyright and are protected by worldwide intellectual property laws. All such rights are reserved.
8.2. You may print off one copy, and may download extracts, of any page(s) from our Site solely for the purposes of evaluating our services for your own internal business purposes, on the basis no content is modified in any way and any proprietary notices are not removed.
9.1. The content on our Site (including any links to other sites and resources) is provided “as is” for general information only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely.
9.2. Although we make reasonable efforts to update the information on our Site, we make no representations, warranties or guarantees, whether express or implied, that the content on our Site is accurate, complete or up to date.
9.3. We assume no responsibility for, and make no warranties that, functions contained on this Site will be uninterrupted or error-free, that defects will be corrected, or that this Site or the server that makes it available will be free of viruses or other harmful components.
9.4. We are not responsible for any content which is not published by us and have no control over content of any third party sites or resources linked to our Site.
10.1. You acknowledge that you are solely responsible for interactions with other users of this Site (if any), and that you are solely responsible for all content you publish or post to this Site or transmit to other users of this Site.
10.2. You must not use any part of the content on our Site for commercial purposes without obtaining a licence to do so from us or our licensors.
10.3. You agree not to post, distribute or reproduce in any way any copyright material, trademarks or other proprietary information without obtaining the prior consent of the owner of such proprietary rights.
10.4.You will not submit any content that contains offensive, obscene or otherwise unlawful references, offensive language, or other material that we may consider could bring us or the Site into disrepute.
10.5. You agree not to transmit any chain letters, spam letters, or junk email to other users, and not to participate in mischievous or malicious behaviour which causes damage or may cause damage to us or this Site or any of the computer systems on which this Site resides.
10.6. You agree not to knowingly introduce viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to this Site, the server on which this Site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to this Site. You must not attack this Site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of-service attack.
10.7. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. We will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will cooperate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use our Site will cease immediately.
10.8. You may link to the home page of our Site, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage our reputation or take advantage of it, e.g., you must not suggest we support your website if that is not the case.
10.9. You must not establish a link to our Site in any website that is not owned by you.
10.10. We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice.
11.1. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits our liability to you for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation and where it would otherwise be unlawful to do so.
11.2. Subject to the foregoing, we exclude all implied conditions, warranties, representations or other terms that may apply to our site or any content on it and will not be liable to you for any loss or damage, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, even if foreseeable, arising under or in connection with:
11.2.1. use of, or inability to use, our Site; or
11.2.2. use of or reliance on any content displayed on our Site.
11.3. In particular, we will not be liable for loss of profits, sales, business, or revenue; business interruption; loss of anticipated savings; loss of business opportunity, goodwill or reputation; or any indirect or consequential loss or damage.
11.4. We do not guarantee that our Site will be secure or free from bugs or viruses. You should use your own virus protection software.
12.1. We may update and change our Site from time to time to reflect changes to our services, our users' needs, changes in the law, regulatory requirements and our business priorities, which may also require changes to these Terms. Every time you wish to use this Site, please check these Terms to ensure you understand the terms that apply at that time.
13.1. We may assign, transfer, and subcontract its rights and/or obligations under these Terms without any notification provided your rights are not materially affected.
13.2. These Terms are personal to you and you are not allowed to assign or transfer your rights under these Terms to anyone else.
14.1. These Terms and any dispute or claim (including non-contractual disputes or claims) arising out of or in connection with them or their subject matter or formation shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the law of England and Wales. Each party irrevocably agrees that the courts of England and Wales shall have exclusive jurisdiction to settle any such dispute or claim.
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