Last updated: 21 June 2023

SMMT Industry Forum Ltd (“SMMT IF”) 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. This Privacy Notice describes SMMT IF’s current practices with regard to Personal Data collected by SMMT IF from you directly and/or through www.industryforum.co.uk (‘website’). This website is owned and operated by SMMT Industry Forum Limited, with registered address at 71 Great Peter Street, London, SW1P 2BN.

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.

1. Link to other web sites

This website contains hyperlinks to websites that are not operated by us. These hyperlinks are provided for your reference and convenience only and do not imply any endorsement of the activities of these third-party websites or any association with their operators. SMMT IF does not control these websites and is not responsible for their data or privacy practices. You are strongly advised to review any privacy notice posted on any site you visit before using the site or provide any Personal Data about yourself.

2. What does SMMT Industry Forum Ltd do?

SMMT Industry Forum Ltd helps major global manufacturers understand, optimise and improve both manufacturing capability and business performance. It is headquartered in the United Kingdom, but with operations all around the world. Industry Forum helps major global manufacturers understand, optimise and improve both manufacturing capability and business performance through consultancy and training services

3. 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” section below.
• In addition, 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” section 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” section 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.

4. How is data collected and used?

The personal information that we may collect about you broadly falls into the following categories:

• Information that you provide voluntarily

SMMT IF collects personal data on this site when such data is submitted by you to us during the registration process.  The personal data you provide will only be used by SMMT IF to process your registration or request. Where you have selected marketing preferences you will be contacted regarding the selected product or service. The personal information that you are asked to provide, and the reasons why you are asked to provide it, will be made clear to you at the point we ask you to provide your personal information.

• Information that we collect automatically

Use of IP Addresses

An Internet Protocol (IP) Address is a set of numbers that is automatically assigned to your computer whenever you log onto your internet service provider or through your organisation’s local area network (LAN) or wide area network (WAN). Web servers automatically identify your computer by the IP address assigned to it during your session. SMMT IF may collect IP addresses for the purposes of systems administration and to audit the use of our site. We do not ordinarily link a user’s IP address to personally identifiable information of that user. Each user’s session will be logged, but the user remains anonymous

5. Marketing and Consent

During the registration process or at any point where personal data is collected by us about you, you may be asked to indicate your preference regarding SMMT IF sending you information about other products or services provided by SMMT IF or the group to which it belongs. You will only be sent information if you have given your consent to receive it and if having given your consent you later change your mind, you are free at any time to amend your details to remove your consent, or simply email us at [email protected] and we will amend your preference for you.

6. Legal basis for processing personal information

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” section below.

7. Sharing Personal Data with Third Parties

We may disclose your personal information to the following categories of recipients:

• to our group companies, third-party services providers (for example courses providers), and partners who provide data processing services to us, examining and certification services (for example, to support the delivery of, provide functionality on, or help to enhance the security of our Website), 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. A list of our current group companies and current service providers is available on request;
• All information provided by delegates will be shared with the Verband der Automobilindustrie (VDA QMC), for example the application form will be shared with Verband der Automobilindustrie (VDA QMC). For more information regarding  Verband der Automobilindustrie (VDA QMC) privacy  policy  please visit the following website: https://vda-qmc.de/datenschutz/
• 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 an actual or potential buyer (and its agents and advisers) in connection with any actual or 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.

8. Aggregated Data

SMMT IF aggregates personal data collected during the registration process and uses this together with the information collected via the use of ‘cookies’ to track data such as the total number of visits to our web sites, visitors to each page of our web sites, and the domain names of our visitors’ internet service providers. Third parties (Google Analytics and WordPress) may be used to assist SMMT IF with the aggregation process and the analysis of subsequent data obtained. We use this information, which remains in aggregate form, to improve and understand how our visitors use our web sites. NO PERSONAL DATA IS DISCLOSED IN THIS PROCESS

9. Cookies

SMMT may place a ‘cookie’ on your computer’s browser. Cookies are small text files, which provide us with information about how often someone visits our site, and what they do during those visits. Cookies do not themselves collect any personal data but if you provide such information to any of our web sites, for example by registering with us, it may be linked to the data stored in the cookie. Where such data is used to produce aggregated data; NO PERSONAL DATA IS DISCLOSED IN THIS PROCESS. For further information about the types of Cookies we use, why, and how you can control Cookies, please see our Cookie Notice:

http://www.industryforum.co.uk/cookies-notice/ 

10. Security

SMMT IF operates secure data networks protected by industry standard firewall and password protection. SMMT IF has security measures in place to attempt to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of your user data under our control. The measures we use are designed to provide a level of security appropriate to the risk of processing your personal information.  Employees who have access to Personal Data have been trained to handle such data properly and in accordance with our security protocols and strict standards of confidentiality. Although we cannot guarantee against any loss, misuse, unauthorised disclosure, alteration or destruction of data, we try to prevent such unfortunate occurrences.

We recommend that you take steps to protect your card details, such as; 

• Do not email your card number 
• Do not share your card number where others can hear you 
• Do not post or email photos of your card

11. 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. 

12. International data transfers

Generally, SMMT IF does not transfer personal data outside of the European Economic Area. Visitors are advised to note however that if you are visiting www.industryforum.co.uk from a country other than the country in which our server is located (currently, the United Kingdom), the various communications will necessarily result in the transfer of information across international boundaries.

In some cases, 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.

We have taken appropriate safeguards to require that your personal information will remain protected in accordance with this Privacy Notice. These include implementing the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses for transfers of personal information between our group companies, which require all group companies to protect personal information they process from the EEA in accordance with European Union data protection law. 

Our Standard Contractual Clauses can be provided on request.  We have implemented similar appropriate safeguards with our third party service providers and partners and further details can be provided upon request.

13. 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.

If you have questions about or need further information how long we retain your personal information, please contact us using the contact details provided under the “How to contact us” section below.

14. How to contact us

Should you have any queries or concerns regarding use of your personal data, please contact our Data and Compliance Manager by writing to the address 71 Great Peter Street London SW1P 2BN, or e-mail [email protected].