Legal

Privacy Policy

Last updated: 1 April 2025

1. Who we are

Stratosphere Ventures ("we", "us", "our") is an angel and pre-seed investment firm headquartered in London, United Kingdom. We operate the website at stratosphere.ventures and process personal data in connection with our investment activities.

For the purposes of UK data protection law, including the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018, we are the data controller of the personal data we collect from you.

If you have any questions about how we handle your personal data, please contact us at info@stratosphere.ventures.

2. What personal data we collect

Depending on how you interact with us, we may collect and process the following categories of personal data:

Identity data: your name, job title, company name and role.
Contact data: your email address, phone number and postal address.
Business and financial data: information contained in pitch decks, business plans, financial models and other materials you share with us as part of an investment enquiry.
Communications data: the content of emails, messages and other correspondence between you and us.
Technical data: your IP address, browser type, operating system, referring URLs and pages visited, collected automatically when you browse our website.
Usage data: information about how you interact with our website, such as which pages you visit and how long you spend on them.

We do not knowingly collect personal data from anyone under the age of 18. Our website and services are directed at business professionals.

3. How we collect your data

We collect personal data through the following means:

Direct interactions: when you email us, submit a pitch, complete a contact form or correspond with us by any other means.
Automated technologies: as you browse our website, we may automatically collect technical and usage data through cookies and similar tracking technologies (see section 8 below).
Third parties: we may receive information about you from publicly available sources such as LinkedIn, Companies House or news publications where this is relevant to our investment activities.

4. How we use your personal data

We use your personal data for the following purposes, and rely on the lawful bases indicated:

To assess and process investment enquiries (legitimate interests): to review pitch materials, conduct due diligence and communicate with founders about potential investments.
To maintain our investor and portfolio records (legitimate interests): to manage our relationships with portfolio companies and co-investors.
To respond to your enquiries (legitimate interests or contract): to answer questions you send to us and provide the information you request.
To operate and improve our website (legitimate interests): to monitor site performance, diagnose technical issues and improve user experience.
To comply with legal obligations (legal obligation): to meet our obligations under applicable law, including anti-money laundering and financial crime regulations.

We do not use your personal data for automated decision-making or profiling that produces legal or similarly significant effects.

5. Sharing your personal data

We do not sell your personal data. We may share it in the following limited circumstances:

Service providers: third-party suppliers who help us operate our website and business (for example, hosting providers, email platforms and analytics tools). These parties act as data processors on our behalf and are contractually required to handle your data securely and only for the purposes we specify.
Professional advisers: solicitors, accountants and other professionals where necessary in connection with investment activities.
Regulatory authorities: where we are required to disclose information by law, court order or regulatory requirement.
Business transfers: if Stratosphere Ventures is involved in a merger, acquisition or restructuring, your data may be transferred to the successor entity, subject to the same privacy protections.

6. International transfers

We are based in the United Kingdom and primarily process your data within the UK and European Economic Area. Where we transfer personal data outside these areas, we ensure appropriate safeguards are in place, such as standard contractual clauses approved by the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), to protect your data to the same standard it receives in the UK.

7. Retention of your data

We retain personal data only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, accounting or reporting requirements.

For investment enquiries that do not proceed, we typically retain pitch materials and associated correspondence for up to three years, after which we securely delete or anonymise them. For portfolio companies and active investor relationships, we retain data for the duration of the relationship and for a period of seven years thereafter to meet our legal and regulatory obligations.

8. Cookies

Our website uses cookies and similar technologies to distinguish you from other users and to improve your experience. We use the following types of cookies:

Strictly necessary cookies: required for the website to function. These cannot be disabled.
Analytical cookies: help us understand how visitors interact with our website, for example through tools such as Google Analytics. Data collected is aggregated and anonymised where possible.

You can control or disable cookies through your browser settings. Please note that disabling certain cookies may affect the functionality of our website.

9. Your rights

Under UK GDPR, you have the following rights in relation to your personal data:

Right of access: to request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
Right to rectification: to ask us to correct inaccurate or incomplete data.
Right to erasure: to request deletion of your personal data where there is no legitimate reason for us to continue processing it.
Right to restrict processing: to ask us to suspend processing of your data in certain circumstances.
Right to data portability: to receive your data in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format.
Right to object: to object to processing based on legitimate interests, including for direct marketing purposes.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at info@stratosphere.ventures. We will respond within one month. We may need to verify your identity before processing your request.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk if you believe we have not handled your personal data in accordance with applicable law.

10. Security

We take the security of your personal data seriously. We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect it against unauthorised access, accidental loss, destruction or damage. These include access controls, encrypted communications and regular review of our data handling practices.

However, no transmission of data over the internet is completely secure. While we do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of data transmitted to our website.

11. Changes to this policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or applicable law. We will update the "last updated" date at the top of this page when we do so. We encourage you to review this page periodically.

12. Contact us

If you have any questions, concerns or requests regarding this privacy policy or our data practices, please contact us at:

info@stratosphere.ventures
Stratosphere Ventures
London, United Kingdom