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META AI ACADEMY KENYA · PITCHATHON

Pitchathon Privacy Notice

This notice explains how your application to the Meta AI Academy Kenya Pitchathon is handled. It adds to our Privacy Policy, which covers the rest of the site. Effective 7 September 2026.

Who is responsible for your application

This Is Digital Limited runs the Pitchathon and is the data controller for your application. Meta is our programme partner: it co-selects the shortlist, hosts the pitch day and the AI Summit in Istanbul, and receives applications from us as described below. Once Meta holds your data it processes it under its own privacy policy as well.

What we collect

The application form asks for:

  • Contact details: your startup’s name, the primary contact’s name, email address and phone number, and your city.
  • Your team: the names, roles and backgrounds of your core team members. By including them you confirm that they know their details are being submitted and agree to this notice.
  • Your business: your problem statement, product, use of Meta technologies, stage, traction, market, impact, planned use of funds and pitch readiness.
  • Documents: a pitch deck, up to five CVs, and up to three registration documents, which may be a certificate of incorporation, a business registration or a founder’s national ID. We ask for these only to confirm eligibility.
  • Declarations: that your team is Kenya-based, builds with Meta’s AI technologies, is available for pitch day and consents to this notice.

The form also records the date and time of submission and your IP address, and uses Google reCAPTCHA to keep bots out. While you work through the form your answers are saved as a draft in our database so you can return to them; drafts that are never submitted are deleted after 30 days.

How we use your application

We use your application to check eligibility, assess it against the published criteria, choose the shortlist and the winners, contact you about the outcome, and organise pitch day in Nairobi and, for the winners, travel to the AI Summit in Istanbul. If you win, we may also announce your startup’s name and a short description publicly and use them in programme communications. We will ask before publishing anything that identifies an individual team member.

We do not use your application for any other purpose, and we do not add you to our newsletter unless you subscribe separately.

Who sees your application

  • Our selection team: the This Is Digital staff and appointed reviewers who assess applications. Reviewers must sign in to open documents, and changes to application records are logged.
  • Meta: as programme partner, Meta may receive any application, including answers and documents, for assessment and to run the programme.
  • Service providers: the site and its uploaded documents are hosted by DigitalOcean in Frankfurt, Germany; confirmation emails are delivered by SMTP2GO; Google reCAPTCHA protects the form. Each acts only on our instructions.
  • Event partners: if you are shortlisted or win, we share the details needed with the pitch-day venue, the summit organisers and, for travel, airlines and hotels.

Application documents are never attached to emails. Our team receives a summary of each application with links that open only for signed-in reviewers.

How long we keep applications

We keep applications and their documents for twelve months after pitch day, which means until 15 October 2027. After that we delete the application, the uploaded documents and our review notes; they disappear from our backups within a further five weeks. If your startup wins, we keep the records needed to administer the prize and to meet our financial-record obligations for five years. Unsubmitted drafts are deleted after 30 days.

Your rights and how to withdraw

You may ask to see, correct or delete your application at any time, and you may withdraw it entirely before the shortlist is announced. Email ai@thisisdigital.ai from the address you applied with and quote your TIDP reference number. Withdrawing removes you from the selection process. The full list of your rights under the Data Protection Act 2019, and how to complain to the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner, is in our Privacy Policy.

Contact

This Is Digital Limited, Ground floor, SNDBX, CMS Africa House, Chania Avenue, Kilimani, Nairobi. Email ai@thisisdigital.ai or call +254 722 268 274.