Since 2017, MERIT has been a unique forum for HR and L&D directors of companies from different industries and Executive Education leaders to learn, share challenges and explore solutions together within an international professional community in a focused, highly interactive environment.
The MERIT Summit is a learning showcase, an ideas conference, and a hands-on strategy session with experts and peers, enabling participants to develop a culture of learning, innovation, and growth in their organisations.
Further to our mission to empower people and organisations The MERIT Awards have been designed to award impactful transformational initiatives in the corporate and higher education sectors.
Your privacy is important to us. This Privacy Policy explains what personal data Atendia Ltd. collects from you, through our interactions with you and through our services, and how we use that data.
Atendia Ltd. offers a wide range of products in the higher education sector, from the organisation of international education and learning events, both in the physical and virtual realm, customised marketing solutions for the higher education sector, and services developed to assist prospective MBA and Masters students in every step of their journey to business school.
The official brands under which we operate and provide services are: Access Masters, Access Schools, PrepAdviser, MERIT Summit, UniMy, and UniMy & Beyond. Atendia Ltd is also the official representative in Europe for the Access MBA and Premier EMBA brands, owned by Advent Group.
Information We Collect
Atendia Ltd. collects data to operate effectively and provide you the best experience with our services. You will provide some of this data directly, such as when you sign up for our email communication or register for an event on our websites. We also collect the information in other various ways such as on social media channels, in-person communication, or during the pre-event selection process when we may contact you for additional clarification regarding your profile or to organise One-to-One meetings for you.
We also obtain data from third parties. We protect data obtained from third parties according to the practices described in this policy, plus any additional restrictions imposed by the source of the data. These third-party sources vary over time, but have included:
You have choices about the data we collect. When you are asked to provide personal data, you may decline. But if you choose not to provide data that is necessary to provide a service, you may not be able to use that service.
The data we collect depends on the context of your interactions with Atendia. The data we collect can include the following:
Name and contact data. We collect your first and last name, email address, postal address, phone number, and other similar contact data.
Credentials. We collect your username and password when you create your personal account on our websites.
Demographic data. We collect data about you such as your date of birth, age, gender, country, citizenship and preferred language.
Educational and professional background. We collect data about your employment history, education history and possibly your standardised test scores.
Content. Information contained in your resume or CV, information you provide regarding your career and educational development interests and other information about your qualifications for MBA or Masters programmes.
Videos and pictures. Photographs or video recordings may be taken during our physical events, for which we will request your written consent. If you give us consent, we may use the visual or video captures of your person on our websites or promotional material. Under no circumstances will we associate your personal information (such as you name) with your image.
Other information you may provide to us, such as in feedback forms or through the "Contact Us" feature on our Sites.
Information Collected By Automated Means
When you visit our websites, we may collect certain information by automated means, such as cookies, web beacons and web server logs. The information we may collect in this manner includes:
A "cookie" is a file that websites send to a visitor’s computer or other Internet-connected device to uniquely identify the visitor’s browser or to store information or settings in the browser. A "web beacon," also known as an Internet tag, pixel tag or clear GIF, links webpages to web servers and their cookies and is used to transmit information collected through cookies back to a web server. Through these automated collection methods, we may obtain "clickstream data," which is a log of the links and other content on which a visitor clicks while browsing a website.
As the visitor clicks through the website, a record of the action may be collected and stored. We link certain data elements we have collected through automated means, such as your browser information, with other information we have obtained about you to let us know, for example, whether you have opened an email we sent to you. Your browser may tell you how to be notified when you receive certain types of cookies or how to restrict or disable certain types of cookies. Please note, however, that without cookies you may not be able to use all of the features of our websites. To the extent required by applicable law, we will obtain your consent before collecting personal information using cookies or similar automated means.
The providers of third-party apps, tools, widgets and plug-ins on our websites, such as social media sharing tools, also may use automated means to collect information regarding your interactions with these features. This information is collected directly by the providers of the features and is subject to the privacy policies or notices of these providers.
How We Use the Information We Collect
Atendia uses the data we collect to operate our business and provide services, which include using data to improve our products and personalise your experience. We may also use the data to communicate with you, for example, informing you about your account, security updates, and product information or to send you promotional communication.
However, to enhance privacy, we have built in technological and procedural safeguards designed to prevent certain data combinations. For example, photographs or video recordings of our physical events will not be connected to your personal data.
Providing and improving our services: We use data to provide and improve the services we offer and perform essential business operations. This includes operating the services, developing new features and conducting research.
Examples of such uses include the following:
Providing our services. We use data to make the connection between the prospective MBA and Masters candidates and the business schools and to deliver a personalised pre-selection process for both sides.
We use data to provide guidance services to the MBA and Masters candidates, including personalised candidate matching and advising, assessing candidates suitability for MBA and Masters programmes, and associate candidate qualifications for the specific programmes.
We use data also to perform data analytics, such as using information to match individuals and potential opportunities, and analysing pipeline data (trends regarding higher education sector).
We use data to connect professionals who are interested in education sector and would like to use our services as mediator in their connection with business schools.
Product Improvement. We use data to continually improve our services. For example, we use your feedback forms to add features to our services or to change them according your experience.
Communication. We use data we collect to communicate with you and personalise our communication with you. For example, we may contact you by phone or email to inform you when we need clarification on the data in your personal account, when your subscription is ending or to discuss educational opportunities that you may be interested in, according to your preference settings.
Additionally, you can sign up for email subscriptions and choose whether you wish to receive promotional communications from Atendia and in relation with the services that our clients are providing.
In addition, we use information collected through cookies, web beacons, pixels, web server logs and other automated means for purposes such as (i) customising our users’ use of our websites; (ii) delivering content tailored to our users’ interests and the manner in which our users use our websites; and (iii) managing our websites and other aspects of our business. To the extent required by applicable law, we will obtain your consent before collecting information using cookies or similar automated means.
We also use third-party analytics services on our websites, such as those of Google Analytics. The analytics providers that administer these services use technologies such as cookies, web server logs and web beacons to help us analyse your use of our websites. The information collected through these means (including IP address) may be disclosed to these analytics providers and other relevant third parties who use the information, for example, to evaluate use of the websites. To learn more about these analytics services and how to opt out, please visit the following sites and any sites contained in the country-specific addenda:
Google Analytics: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout
Information We Share
We do not disclose personal information we collect about you, except as described in this Global Privacy Policy or in separate notices provided in connection with particular activities.
In addition, we may disclose information about you (i) if we are required to do so by law or legal process; (ii) to law enforcement authorities or other government officials based on a lawful disclosure request; and (iii) when we believe disclosure is necessary or appropriate to prevent physical harm or financial loss, or in connection with an investigation of suspected or actual fraudulent or illegal activity. We also reserve the right to transfer personal information we have about you in the event we sell or transfer all or a portion of our business or assets (including in the event of a re-organisation, dissolution, or liquidation).
Your Rights and Choices
Data Transfers
We transfer the personal information we collect about you to countries outside of the country in which the information originally was collected. Those countries may not have the same data protection laws as the country in which you initially provided the information. When we transfer your information to other countries, we will protect that information as described in this Privacy Policy.
If you are located in the European Economic Area ("EEA") or Switzerland, we will comply with applicable legal requirements providing adequate protection for the transfer of personal information to recipients in countries outside of the EEA or Switzerland.
Intra-group international data transfers will be subject to legally binding agreements referred to as Binding Corporate Rules (BCR) which provide enforceable rights for data subjects.
Our Retention of Personal Data
We retain personal data for as long as necessary to provide services you have requested, or for other essential purposes such as complying with our legal obligations, resolving disputes, and enforcing our agreements. Because these needs can vary for different data types in the context of different services, actual retention periods can vary significantly. In any case we will keep it for period no longer than five years.
How We Protect Personal Information
We maintain administrative, technical and physical safeguards designed to protect the personal information you provide against accidental, unlawful or unauthorised destruction, loss, alteration, access, disclosure or use.
How to Contact Us
If you have any questions or comments about this Privacy Policy, would like to exercise your rights or would like us to update information we have about you or your preferences, please contacts us at:
Address: 36 Alabin str.
1000 Sofia, Bulgaria
Phone: +359 2 810 54 80
Email: contact@atendia.net
Data Protection Officer: dpo@adventgroup.net
Updates to this Privacy Policy
We regularly review and, if appropriate, update this privacy policy from time to time as our services and use of personal data evolve. If we want to make use of your personal data in a way that we have not previously identified, we will contact you to provide information about this and, if necessary, ask for your consent.
We will update the version number and date of this document each time it is changed.