Legal
Privacy Policy
Last updated: August 2026
1. Who we are
The International AI Startup Challenge is a student-run competition. Akshay Singh is the organizer and the point of contact for anything relating to your data; Paul Hintz serves as faculty advisor. We are the controller of the personal information described below, and contact details are on our Contact page.
2. What we collect at registration
Your first and last name, email address, age, country, optionally your school, and your team status. Participants under 18 also provide a parent or guardian email address and confirm they have permission to take part. We store a one-way hash of your IP address to detect duplicate and automated signups; we do not store the address itself.
3. What we collect at submission
Your team and startup name, a one-line description, links to your pitch video and any deck or prototype, your three founder Q&A answers, and how long you spent on each answer. Submission timestamps are recorded. Your video is not uploaded to us — it stays on whichever service you host it on, and we store only the link.
4. Where it is stored
All of it is stored in Airtable, a third-party database service. Confirmation and notification emails are sent through Resend. The site itself is hosted by Vercel. These providers process data on our behalf and only for the purpose of running the competition.
5. How we use it
To run the competition: confirming registration, sending resources and updates, verifying your identity when you sign in to submit, scoring your submission, and issuing awards. Guardian email addresses are used only for consent and safeguarding, never for marketing.
6. What we never do
We do not sell your information. We do not share it with sponsors, advertisers, or any third party beyond the service providers named above. We do not publish your submission, your project, or your Q&A answers.
7. Participants under 18
IASC is designed for students aged 13 to 18. We collect the minimum necessary, require confirmation of parent or guardian permission at registration, and keep a guardian contact on file for every participant under 18. Guardians may contact us at any time to review or delete their child's information.
8. How long we keep it
Registration and submission data is kept for the duration of the competition cycle and deleted within 12 months of the finals, except for the names of award recipients, which we retain so we can verify credentials if someone asks us to confirm them later.
9. Your rights
You can ask us for a copy of your data, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it. Email the address on our Contact page with the subject line 'Data request' and we will action it within 30 days. You do not need to give a reason. Deleting your data before the deadline withdraws you from the competition.
10. Email
Registered participants receive competition updates by email. Every bulk email includes an unsubscribe link and our postal address. Unsubscribing stops updates but does not withdraw your entry — email us separately if that is what you want.