Privacy and cookies policies

 Last updated: 26/01/2023
 
Games Investor Consulting Ltd (“GIC”) respects your right to privacy.  This Privacy Notice explains who we are, how we collect, share and use personal information about you, and how you can exercise your privacy rights.  If you have any questions or concerns about our use of your personal information, then please contact us using the contact details provided at the bottom of this Privacy Notice.
 
What does GIC do?
GIC is a consultancy specialising in the business of games, headquartered in London, UK.  We provide business intelligence relating to all facets of the global games industry. Please explore this site for more information about our services and clients.
 
What personal information does GIC collect and why?
The personal information that we may collect about you broadly falls into the following categories:
 

  • Information that you provide voluntarily

We might ask you to provide certain information voluntarily.  The types of personal information we ask you to provide, and the reasons why we ask you to provide it, include:


Types of personal information: Contact details and job title
Why we collect it: This allows us to maintain and improve the accuracy of the records we hold about you
If we ask you to provide any other personal information not described above, then the personal information we will ask you to provide, and the reasons why we ask you to provide it, will be made clear to you at the point we collect your personal information.
 

  • Information that we may collect automatically

We may also collect certain information automatically from your device.  In some countries, including countries in the European Economic Area, this information may be considered personal information under applicable data protection laws.

Specifically, the information we collect automatically may include information like your IP address, device type, unique device identification numbers, browser-type, broad geographic location (e.g. country or city-level location) and other technical information.  We may also collect information about how your device has interacted with our website, including the pages accessed and links clicked. We may also collect information related to web pages you visited prior to coming to this website.

Collecting this information enables us to better understand the visitors who come to our website, where they come from, and what content on our website is of interest to them.  We use this information for our internal analytics purposes and to improve the quality and relevance of our website to our visitors.

Some of this information may be collected using cookies and similar tracking technology, as explained further under the heading “Cookies and similar tracking technology” below.
 

  • Information that we obtain from third party sources

From time to time, we may receive personal information about you from third party sources, but only where we have checked that these third parties either have your consent or are otherwise legally permitted or required to disclose your personal information to us. 

The types of information we collect from third parties might include your contact details and we use the information we receive from these third parties to maintain and improve the accuracy of the records we hold about you.

 In general, we will use the personal information we collect from you only for the purposes described in this Privacy Notice or for purposes that we explain to you at the time we collect your personal information.  However, we may also use your personal information for other purposes that are not incompatible with the purposes we have disclosed to you (such as archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes, or statistical purposes) if and where this is permitted by applicable data protection laws.

  • Information that we obtain from you related to a purchase

When you buy something on this website, we collect personal information from you to fulfill the order. We may collect information like your:

  • Billing and shipping address

  • Details relating to your purchase (for example, your shirt size)

  • Email address

  • Name

  • Phone number

We share this information with Squarespace, our online store hosting provider, so that they can provide website services to us.

As you go through checkout, this site may auto-complete your shipping and billing address by sharing what you type with the Google Places API and returning suggestions to you to improve your checkout experience.

We may email you with messages about your order or account activity. For example, we may email you to tell you that:

  • You’ve created a customer account

  • Your customer account password has been reset or updated

  • You’ve made a purchase

  • Your order has shipped

It’s not possible to unsubscribe from these messages.

We share your contact information with Squarespace, our website hosting provider, so they can send these emails to you on our behalf.

  • Information that we obtain from you during a form block or survey

When you submit information to this website via webform, we collect the data requested in the webform in order to track and respond to your submissions. We share this information with Squarespace, our online store hosting provider, so that they can provide website services to us.

  • Information that we obtain from you related to sharing content from this website

This website may includes share buttons which enable you to share pages or other content from this site to the following third party services: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn. If you click a share button, these third parties may receive your personal data, including:

  • Information about your browser, network and device

  • Details about the web page or content you shared or proposed to share

  • Your IP address

  • Information that we obtain from you related to commenting on content from this website

This website may include commenting functionality on some pages which enables you to post a comment. This website collects personal data when you post a comment, including:

  • Your name (which will be displayed as part of your posted comment)

  • Your email address (optional, to let you know if someone replies to your comment)

  • Your website URL (optional)

This website may include “likes” functionality on some blog posts which enables you to “like” a post. This website collects personal data when you like a post to try to prevent the same person from liking the same post during the same visit, including:

  • Information about your browser, network and device

  • Details about the web page or content you shared or proposed to share

  • Your IP address

  • Information that we obtain from you related to you subscribing to email newsletters

We may send you marketing emails, which you can unsubscribe from by clicking the link at the bottom of the email. We share your contact information with Squarespace, our email marketing provider, so they can send these emails on our behalf.

Who does GIC share my personal information with?
We may disclose your personal information to the following categories of recipients:

  • to our third party services providers and partners who provide data processing services to us, or who otherwise process personal information for purposes that are described in this Privacy Notice or notified to you when we collect your personal information;to any competent law enforcement body, regulatory, government agency, court or other third party where we believe disclosure is necessary (i) as a matter of applicable law or regulation, (ii) to exercise, establish or defend our legal rights, or (iii) to protect your vital interests or those of any other person; 

  • to a potential buyer (and its agents and advisers) in connection with any proposed purchase, merger or acquisition of any part of our business, provided that we inform the buyer it must use your personal information only for the purposes disclosed in this Privacy Notice;

  •  to any other person with your consent to the disclosure. 

Legal basis for processing personal information (EEA visitors only)
If you are a visitor from the European Economic Area, our legal basis for collecting and using the personal information described above will depend on the personal information concerned and the specific context in which we collect it.

However, we will normally collect personal information from you only where we have your consent to do so, where we need the personal information to perform a contract with you, or where the processing is in our legitimate interests and not overridden by your data protection interests or fundamental rights and freedoms.  In some cases, we may also have a legal obligation to collect personal information from you or may otherwise need the personal information to protect your vital interests or those of another person.

If we ask you to provide personal information to comply with a legal requirement or to perform a contract with you, we will make this clear at the relevant time and advise you whether the provision of your personal information is mandatory or not (as well as of the possible consequences if you do not provide your personal information). 

Similarly, if we collect and use your personal information in reliance on our legitimate interests (or those of any third party), we will make clear to you at the relevant time what those legitimate interests are.

If you have questions about or need further information concerning the legal basis on which we collect and use your personal information, please contact us using the contact details provided under the “How to contact us” heading below.
 
Cookies and similar tracking technology
This website uses cookies and similar technologies (collectively, “Cookies”), which are small files or pieces of text that download to a device when a visitor accesses a website or app. For information about viewing the cookies dropped on your device, visit The cookies Squarespace uses.

 
How does GIC keep my personal information secure?
We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect the personal information that we collect and process about you.  The measures we use are designed to provide a level of security appropriate to the risk of processing your personal information. 
 
International data transfers
Your personal information may be transferred to, and processed in, countries other than the country in which you are resident.  These countries may have data protection laws that are different to the laws of your country (and, in some cases, may not be as protective).

Specifically, our servers are located in the USA, and our third party service providers and partners operate around the world.  This means that when we collect your personal information we may process it in any of these countries.
 However, we have taken appropriate safeguards to require that your personal information will remain protected in accordance with this Privacy Notice.
 
Data retention
We retain personal information we collect from you where we have an ongoing legitimate business need to do so (for example, to provide you with a service you have requested or to comply with applicable legal, tax or accounting requirements). 
 When we have no ongoing legitimate business need to process your personal information, we will either delete or anonymise it or, if this is not possible (for example, because your personal information has been stored in backup archives), then we will securely store your personal information and isolate it from any further processing until deletion is possible.
 
Your data protection rights
You have the following data protection rights:

  • If you wish to access, correct, update or request deletion of your personal information, you can do so at any time by contacting us using the contact details provided under the “How to contact us” heading below. 

  • In addition, if you are a resident of the European Union, you can object to processing of your personal information, ask us to restrict processing of your personal information or request portability of your personal information. Again, you can exercise these rights by contacting us using the contact details provided under the “How to contact us” heading below.

  •  You have the right to opt-out of marketing communications we send you at any time.  You can exercise this right by clicking on the “unsubscribe” or “opt-out” link in the marketing e-mails we send you.  To opt-out of other forms of marketing (such as postal marketing or telemarketing), then please contact us using the contact details provided under the “How to contact us” heading below.

  •  Similarly, if we have collected and process your personal information with your consent, then you can withdraw your consent at any time.  Withdrawing your consent will not affect the lawfulness of any processing we conducted prior to your withdrawal, nor will it affect processing of your personal information conducted in reliance on lawful processing grounds other than consent.

  •  You have the right to complain to a data protection authority about our collection and use of your personal information.  For more information, please contact your local data protection authority. (Contact details for data protection authorities in the European Economic Area, Switzerland and certain non-European countries (including the US and Canada) are available here.)

 We respond to all requests we receive from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with applicable data protection laws.
 
Updates to this Privacy Notice
We may update this Privacy Notice from time to time in response to changing legal, technical or business developments. When we update our Privacy Notice, we will take appropriate measures to inform you, consistent with the significance of the changes we make.  We will obtain your consent to any material Privacy Notice changes if and where this is required by applicable data protection laws.
 You can see when this Privacy Notice was last updated by checking the “last updated” date displayed at the top of this Privacy Notice. 
 
How to contact us
If you have any questions or concerns about our use of your personal information, please contact us using the following details: GIC Data Controller, Games Investor Consulting Ltd, 5-7 Vernon Yard, Portobello Road, London, W11 2DX, United Kingdom or use the email form in the Contact section of this site.