1. Who we are
Founder Engine Ltd is a private limited company registered in Scotland, company number SC893040, with its registered office at 3 Hill Street, Edinburgh EH2 3JP. For the purposes of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018, Founder Engine Ltd is the controller of the personal data described in this notice.
We do not have a statutory Data Protection Officer. Data protection matters are handled by the company's directors. You can reach us at info@founder-engine.co.uk or by post at the registered office above.
This notice covers our website only. Where we work with a client company on an engagement, the handling of that client's data is governed by the contract and data processing terms agreed with that client, not by this notice.
2. What we collect and why
We collect only what the specific interaction needs. In practice that means one of the following.
2.1 The AI-native quiz
When you take the quiz at /quiz we record your answers to each question, an optional free-text comment, and the email address you give us at the final step so we can send you your result. We also record how you arrived at the site (referrer and any campaign tags in the link you clicked) and a technical event log of which quiz steps you completed, so we can see where people drop out and improve the questions.
We use this to: send you your result by email; understand, in aggregate, where UK founders and their teams are on AI adoption; and, if you ask for it, contact you about the founding cohort of the Founder Kit or to arrange a call. Your individual answers are not shared with anyone outside Founder Engine.
2.2 Buying the Founder Kit
Purchases and reservations (the £50 refundable deposit or the founding-cohort place) are taken through Stripe. When you buy, Stripe collects your name, email address, billing details and payment card data directly. Founder Engine never sees or stores your full card number. Stripe passes us your name, email, the product bought, the amount paid, and a short reference that tells us which campaign or page you came from. We use this to deliver what you bought, keep the accounting records the law requires, and provide support. After a successful checkout you land on a confirmation page on our site and we record the reservation so we can honour it. Deposits are refundable in full within 14 days on request, or if the cohort does not run: email info@founder-engine.co.uk.
Stripe acts as an independent controller for the payment itself. Its privacy notice is at stripe.com/gb/privacy.
2.3 Booking a call or emailing us
If you book a call, the booking is taken through Cal.com and we receive the name, email address, and any notes you enter, plus the time you chose. If you email info@founder-engine.co.uk, we hold your email and whatever you choose to tell us. We use all of this to respond to you and, where the conversation continues, to run the engagement.
2.4 Website analytics
We use PostHog, hosted in the European Union, to understand how the site is used: which pages are visited, which quiz steps are completed, which buttons are clicked. Until you accept cookies, this runs in a cookieless mode that keeps nothing on your device between visits and does not record your session. If you accept, PostHog may set cookies to recognise a returning browser and may record how you move through the page (session replay) so we can fix confusing screens. Session replay masks form inputs by default.
2.5 Advertising measurement
If, and only if, you accept cookies, we load the Meta (Facebook and Instagram) pixel. It tells Meta that a browser which saw one of our adverts reached this site and took an action such as completing the quiz or making a purchase, so we can measure whether our advertising works and reach similar audiences. Meta receives your IP address, browser information, and the page and event; it may match this to your Meta account under its own privacy policy at facebook.com/privacy/policy. Where we send the same events to Meta from our servers, they carry a shared event identifier so the event is not double counted.
2.6 Technical data
Our hosting provider (Vercel) records standard server logs: IP address, browser type, the pages requested and the time. We use these for security, to keep the site running, and to diagnose faults. They are not used to profile you.
What we do not do. We do not sell personal data. We do not buy or append third-party data to what you give us. We do not run a newsletter you get put on for taking the quiz. We do not use your quiz answers to make any decision about you that has legal or similar effects.
3. Our lawful bases
UK GDPR requires a lawful basis for each use of personal data. Ours are:
| Purpose | Lawful basis |
|---|---|
| Sending your quiz result and answering enquiries | Taking steps at your request before a contract (Article 6(1)(b)) and our legitimate interest in responding to people who contact us (Article 6(1)(f)) |
| Delivering a purchase, receipts, support | Performance of a contract (Article 6(1)(b)) |
| Keeping accounting and tax records | Legal obligation (Article 6(1)(c)), Companies Act 2006 and HMRC rules |
| Cookieless, aggregate analytics and site security | Legitimate interests (Article 6(1)(f)): running a website that works and knowing whether it does. We have balanced this against your interests and keep the data minimal and non-identifying. |
| Analytics cookies, session replay, Meta pixel | Your consent (Article 6(1)(a)), given through the cookie banner and withdrawable at any time (see section 4) |
| Telling you about the Founder Kit founding cohort or related Founder Engine services after you take the quiz or buy from us | Legitimate interests (Article 6(1)(f)) for business-to-business contact, with the "soft opt-in" under the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR) where it applies. Every message carries an unsubscribe. |
6. International transfers
Some of the providers above are outside the United Kingdom. Where personal data leaves the UK we rely on one of the safeguards recognised under UK GDPR: the UK Government's adequacy regulations (which cover the European Economic Area), the UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework for certified US providers, or the International Data Transfer Agreement or UK Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses. You can ask us for details of the safeguard used for any specific provider by emailing info@founder-engine.co.uk.
7. How long we keep data
- Quiz responses and email: 24 months from your last interaction with us, after which the email is deleted and the answers are kept only in anonymised, aggregate form.
- Enquiries and call bookings: 24 months from our last contact, unless the conversation becomes a client engagement, in which case the engagement contract governs.
- Purchase and invoicing records: 6 years from the end of the financial year in which the transaction took place, as required for company and tax records.
- Analytics data: PostHog event data is retained for up to 12 months; session recordings for up to 30 days.
- Server logs: Rolling 30 days.
- Consent record: Kept in your browser until you clear it.
Where you ask us to delete your data sooner (see section 9) we will do so unless the law requires us to keep it.
8. Security
Data is transmitted over encrypted connections (TLS) and stored with providers that encrypt data at rest. Access to systems holding personal data is limited to people who need it, protected by strong authentication, and reviewed when roles change. Payment card data never touches our systems. No transmission over the internet is completely secure; if we become aware of a breach that is likely to put your rights at risk we will tell you and the Information Commissioner's Office as the law requires.
9. Your rights
Under UK GDPR you have the right to:
- Access the personal data we hold about you and receive a copy;
- Rectify data that is inaccurate or incomplete;
- Erase your data ("right to be forgotten") where there is no overriding reason for us to keep it;
- Restrict processing while a dispute about accuracy or grounds is resolved;
- Portability: receive data you gave us in a machine-readable format where we process it by automated means on the basis of consent or contract;
- Object to processing based on legitimate interests, and to direct marketing at any time;
- Withdraw consent at any time where consent is the basis, without affecting processing already carried out.
To exercise any right, email info@founder-engine.co.uk from the address you used with us, or write to the registered office. We aim to act within seven days and will in any case respond within one month, extendable by two further months for complex requests, and we will tell you if that is the case. There is no fee unless a request is manifestly unfounded or excessive. We may need to verify your identity before acting.
10. Marketing
Founder Engine sells to businesses. If you take the quiz, buy from us or enquire, we may email you about the Founder Kit founding cohort or closely related Founder Engine services. We do not send a general newsletter off the back of the quiz, and we do not pass your details to third parties for their marketing. Every marketing email includes an unsubscribe link, and you can also stop them at any time by emailing info@founder-engine.co.uk. Transactional messages (your quiz result, receipts, replies to your questions) are not marketing and will still be sent.
11. Automated processing and AI
The quiz scores your answers automatically to place your business at one of four AI-adoption stages and suggest one next step. This is informational only; it produces no legal or similarly significant effect on you and no decision is made about you as a result. We use AI-assisted tools, including large language models, to summarise responses in aggregate and to help draft the material we produce; we do not use them to profile individuals from website data, and we do not train models on your personal data.
12. Children
This site and our services are for businesses and the adults who run them. We do not knowingly collect personal data from anyone under 18. If you believe a child has given us data, email us and we will delete it.
13. Changes to this notice
We will update this notice when our processing changes, for example if we add a provider or a new form. The version number and effective date at the top will change, and for material changes we will draw attention to them on the site or by email where we hold your address.
14. Contact and complaints
Questions, requests and complaints about personal data: info@founder-engine.co.uk, or Founder Engine Ltd, 3 Hill Street, Edinburgh EH2 3JP.
If you are unhappy with how we have handled your data you have the right to complain to the UK supervisory authority, the Information Commissioner's Office: ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint, telephone 0303 123 1113, or by post to Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF. We would appreciate the chance to resolve your concern first.
This notice, and any dispute arising from it, is governed by the law of Scotland, and the Scottish courts have jurisdiction, without prejudice to your statutory rights under UK data protection law wherever in the UK you are.