Legal pages

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY PRIOR TO USING THE WEBSITE.

THE WEBSITE IS INTENDED TO USERS WHO ARE AT LEAST EIGHTEEN (18) YEARS OLD.

THUS, BY USING THE WEBSITE, YOU CONFIRM THAT YOU ARE AT LEAST EIGHTEEN (18) YEARS OLD AND YOU ARE DEEMED TO HAVE READ AND ACCEPTED THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS EXHAUSTIVELY AND UNCONDITIONALLY. IN THE EVENT YOU DO NOT ACCEPT WHOLE OR PART OF THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS, YOU MUST IMMEDIATELY STOP USING THE WEBSITE.

VERSION IN FORCE AS OF: Juillet 2020

1. PURPOSE OF THE WEBSITE

The purpose of the Website is to provide You with useful information on the activities, products and latest news of Ardian. In this respect, please note that the Website is not intended to make Ardian act as a broker or dealer with respect to securities whatsoever. 

2. ENTRY INTO FORCE AND DURATION

These T&Cs lay down the conditions pursuant to which You are entitled to access and use the Website. As such, the T&Cs constitute a contractual agreement between You and Ardian.

These T&Cs shall apply from Your first access to the Website and shall remain applicable as long as You use the Website.

If You are a Registered User, please note that You shall remain bound by the provisions specifically dedicated to Registered Users as long as You benefit from a Registered User profile. In practice, this means that You shall comply with these provisions even when You are not actually browsing the Website (e.g. You must keep Your Login and Password personal even when You are not browsing the Website).

3. DEFINITIONS

“Ardian” means Ardian France, à French société anonyme, having its registered office at 20 Place Vendôme – 75001 Paris and registered with the Paris registry of trade and companies under the number 403 201 882.

“Intellectual Property Rights” means trademarks, service marks, rights in trade names, business names, logos or get-up, patents, petty patents, utility models, supplementary protection certificates, rights in inventions, registered and unregistered design rights, specifications, schematics, diagrams, copyrights, semi-conductor topography rights, database rights, rights in domain names and URLs, rights to sue for passing off and in unfair competition, rights in opposition proceedings and all other similar rights in any part of the world including, where such rights are obtained or enhanced by registration, any registration of such rights and applications and rights to apply for such registrations, including any right in priority attached thereto.

“Investor Section” means the pages specifically dedicated to Registered Users and which can only be accessed thanks to Your Login and Password. The Investor Section is accessible through the dedicated portal accessible from the Website and operated by Intralinks.

“Login” means the login You were personally granted by Ardian or on its behalf in order to access the Investor Section.

“Newsletter” means the Ardian newsletter You can subscribe to thanks to the Website.

“Password” means the password You use for accessing the Investor Section, disregarding whether You determined this password Yourself or You were granted such password by Ardian or on its behalf.

“Registered User” means a user of the Website benefiting from an investor profile as discretionarily determined by Ardian and who is provided with a Login and Password by Ardian to access the Investor Section.

“T&Cs” means these terms and conditions, including any document incorporated therein by reference, and any subsequent versions thereof.

“You; Your; Yourself” means you as a user of the Website.

“Website” means the website accessible at the following address: www.ardian.com.

4. NATURE OF THE INFORMATION PROVIDED ON THE WEBSITE

To the exception of these T&Cs, please note that the information on the Website shall not be regarded as information of a contractual nature and nothing on the Website should be construed as an offer, invitation or general solicitation to buy or to sell products, or as a recommendation and/or invitation to tender, or as a public offering of securities.

The information available on the Website is provided solely for informational purposes. Even though Ardian strives to publish complete, accurate and up-to-date information on the Website, Ardian does neither represent nor warrant that such information is ultimately complete, accurate, up-to-date and/or fitted to Your particular situation as of the date You access it.

As a result, You shall take any and all steps to check and verify the completeness, accuracy, validity and suitability of any and all information accessible on the Website.

Besides, please be aware that the information on the Website does not constitute an investment recommendation or advice of any kind whatsoever and may not be appropriate to Your individual requirements, needs and situation. Please keep in mind that investments in private equity expose investors to risk. 

In this respect, You are hereby expressly informed that past performance is no guarantee of future results and that, as the value of the units depends on the value of the securities held in the portfolio, the value of investments can fall as well as rise. This means that investors, including You, may not recover the whole or part of the amount of their initial investment and no guarantee of income is given.

5. YOUR RIGHTS AND OBLIGATIONS

Subject to Your strict compliance with the T&Cs, Ardian grants You a personal, worldwide, free of charge, non-assignable, non-sublicensable and revocable license to use the Website. As a result, You shall use the Website for Your personal purposes only, excluding notably any commercial use without the prior written consent of Ardian.

While using the Website, You shall refrain from any act and/or omission which could: (i) impair the proper functioning of the Website; (ii) damage Ardian’ s interests, rights and/or reputation; (iii) damage third parties’ interests, rights and/or reputation; (iv) be contrary to public order; and (v) be deemed and/or held illicit, illegal or amounting to a contractual breach.
You shall refrain from:

  • copying, modifying, communicating, creating derivative work or reproducing whole or part of the Website’s content without Ardian’ s prior written consent;
  • disturbing, hindering and/or preventing the proper functioning of the Website by actions or omissions of any kind whatsoever (notably by downloading viruses or malicious code whatsoever or by performing hacking activities of any nature);
  • downloading, uploading, using, sharing and/or communicating any content infringing, or likely to infringe, intellectual property rights of Ardian or third parties, whatever their kind;
  • using software and/or automated systems to scan and to extract from the Website information and content and/or to understand the browsing structure, functioning or display of the Website;
  • performing vulnerability and/or penetration testing on the Website;
  • sharing with Ardian (or any persons acting on its behalf) any information of any kind whatsoever that is: (i) inaccurate, false or misleading; (ii) likely to violate third-parties’ rights, including notably third-parties’ Intellectual Property Rights; (iii) denigrating, defamatory and/or insulting (e.g. racist or homophobic language);
  • violating any legal and/or regulatory rules or requirements applicable;
  • fostering or promoting any activity violating these T&Cs;
  • usurping or attempting to usurp someone else’s identity; and
  • accessing or attempting to access the Investor Section if You do not or no longer qualify as Registered User.

Ardian reserves the right to take any action it may deem appropriate (including notably investigating and bringing legal action) to remedy Your non-compliance with Your obligations as specified under these T&Cs.

6. REGISTERED USERS

As a Registered User, You are entitled to access the Investor Section. Please note that access to and use of the Investor Section is conditional upon Your status as Registered User, which is discretionarily determined by Ardian. In other words, from the moment You no longer qualify as Registered User, You must refrain from accessing (or trying to access) the Investor Section.

In any event, please note that the obligations imposed upon You, pursuant to the T&Cs, while You use the Website shall apply mutatis mutandis to You while You use the Investor Section as a Registered User.

Subject to Your strict compliance with the T&Cs and Your qualification as Registered User, Ardian grants You a personal, worldwide, free of charge, non-assignable, non-sublicensable and revocable license to use the Investor Section. As a result, You shall use the Investor Section for Your personal purposes only, excluding notably any commercial use. 

For sake of clarity, please note that the Investor Section is operated by a third-party service provider: Intralinks, Inc. Thus, where You are willing to access the Investor Section, You are going to be redirected to Intralinks, Inc.’s portal in order to log in. Intralinks, Inc. will administer Your Login and Password on behalf of Ardian.

In the event You forget Your password, You may recover a new password by using the dedicated link on the Intralinks, Inc.’s portal. In any event, Ardian invites You to read Intralinks, Inc.’s terms and conditions available on Intralinks, Inc.’s portal and requires that You comply with them prior to logging in the Investor Section.

As a Registered User, You shall bear sole responsibility for use of Your Login and Password.
You shall comply with the following obligations:

  • You commit to take all appropriate measures to ensure that Your Login and Password remain confidential, personal and safe, notably by refraining from sharing Your Login and Password with anyone else (including, without limitation, Your colleagues and co-workers); and
  • if You become aware that Your Login and/or Password are lost, stolen and/or accessed by any unauthorized third-party, You shall inform Ardian immediately by sending an email to clientservicing@ardian.com so that Ardian can deactivate the access to the Investor Section linked to Your Login and Password.

For sake of clarity, please note that any and all use of Your Login and Password for accessing the Investor Section shall be deemed made by You, and You shall be liable accordingly unless You have expressly informed Ardian in writing that Your Login and/or Password have been lost, stolen and/or accessed by any unauthorized third party.

Unless Ardian has not deactivated in due time Your Login and/or Password upon receipt of Your notification, Ardian shall not be held liable in any manner whatsoever for any incorrect or fraudulent use of Your Login and/or Password as well as for any consequences resulting therefrom (including notably damages, losses, costs, expenses and loss of profit You or any third party may suffer).

In addition, You shall not use, share or communicate to any person, except as required by applicable law or any legal or regulatory authority, any information contained on the Investor Section which is designated by Ardian as confidential or proprietary, or which You should reasonably consider to be confidential or proprietary considering all the circumstances surrounding the disclosure thereof. You shall use Your best endeavours to prevent the communication or disclosure of the same.

In the event You do not comply with all or part of these T&Cs, and without prejudice to any other remedy it may have, Ardian shall be entitled to suspend or revoke Your right to access and use the Investor Section, either temporarily or definitively, as of right, immediately and without any indemnification, compensation or refund whatsoever being owed.

Ardian’ s liability shall not be incurred in the event the suspension or revocation of Your rights to access the Investor Section results from a report by a third-party or a court injunction which eventually turns out to be groundless.

In the event Ardian considers that the cause leading to the suspension or revocation of Your right to access the Investor Section has been remedied, Ardian may in its sole discretion decide to end such suspension or revocation but shall be under no obligation to do so.

7. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

The whole elements constituting the Website and the Newsletter (including, without limitation, software, data, databases, texts, images, videos, logos, brands, trademarks, graphs, photographs, etc.) are protected by Intellectual Property Rights and are the exclusive property of Ardian or of third parties from which Ardian was granted the necessary rights.

As a result such elements are strictly intended for Your personal use and cannot be reproduced, altered, modified, copied, downloaded or communicated to third parties otherwise than as expressly authorized under these T&Cs, in whole or in part, for commercial or non-commercial purposes, on any medium, without the prior written consent of Ardian.

Any breach of the provisions specified in the above paragraph is deemed counterfeiting and can lead You to incur civil and/or criminal liability pursuant to the provisions of the French Intellectual Property Code.

In any event, You hereby expressly acknowledge and accept that using the Website and receiving the Newsletter cannot: (i) result in any transfer of ownership, for Your benefit, with respect to whole or part of the Website and/or the Newsletter; and (ii) grant You any license whatsoever exceeding what is strictly necessary for Your sole access to and consultation of the Website and the Newsletter.

8. LIABILITY

Please note that the Website and the Investor Section are provided on an “as is” basis. Except as expressly specified otherwise in these T&Cs, all express or implied warranties or representations are excluded to the fullest extent permissible by applicable law.

In this context, You shall bear sole and exclusive responsibility for using any information available on the Website, the Investor Section (if You are a Registered User) and the Newsletter before making any decisions or taking any actions based on such information.

You acknowledge and agree that access to and use of the Website and/or the Newsletter is at Your own risk. To the fullest extent permissible by applicable law, Ardian excludes its liability for any damages, losses, costs, expenses and loss of profit, of whatever nature and kind, resulting from or arising out of Your access to and use of the Website and/or the Newsletter, including notably any information, opinions and content accessible thereon.

Despite Ardian’ s commercially reasonable efforts, technical errors and malfunctions may occur. These could result, for example, from restricted access to or faulty reproduction of information, caused by either the Website itself or the actions of third parties. Ardian shall not be liable, on any grounds whatsoever, for any damages, losses, costs, expenses and loss of profit, of whatever nature and kind, resulting or arising out of such technical errors and malfunctions.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, nothing in these T&Cs shall limit or exclude Ardian’ s liability for (i) wilful misrepresentation or (ii) gross negligence.

You agree to indemnify, defend and hold harmless Ardian from and against all claims, liabilities, demands, damages, losses or expenses, including notably legal fees and costs, resulting from or arising out of Your improper access to or use of the Website and/or any breach of these T&Cs attributable to You.

9. ACCESSIBILITY OF THE WEBSITE

Ardian does not warrant that Your access and use of the Website, and the Investor Section if You are a Registered User, will be uninterrupted, timely and free from errors, malfunctions, viruses and malicious codes of any kind whatsoever.

10. DATA PROTECTION 

For Your perfect information, please note that information enabling to identify You directly or indirectly (hereinafter “Personal Data”) is processed by Ardian in relation to Your use of the Website, including by means of cookies.

To know more about the processing of Personal Data implemented by Ardian as well as its use of cookies, please refer to Ardian’s privacy policy and cookies policy.

11. LINKS TO OTHER WEBSITES

The Website may display hypertext links redirecting to pages and websites published, in whole or in part, by third parties which are not related to Ardian. For example, as a Registered User, You will be redirected to Intralinks, Inc. portal for accessing the Investor Section.

In this respect, please note that Ardian neither has any control over the content published by such third parties nor monitors such content. As a result, Ardian shall in no event be held liable in respect of any content published by third parties whatsoever.

You are hereby invited to read the terms and conditions governing third-party pages and websites You access after clicking on hypertext links displayed on the Website or the Investor Section.

Links redirecting to the Website are only allowed subject to the express prior written consent of Ardian.

12. SECURITY

Ardian cannot guarantee the confidentiality of any of Your information passing over the Internet network. By accessing and using the Website (or the Investor Section if You are a Registered User), You expressly acknowledge and accept that electronic communications may not be free from interferences with third parties.

Ardian shall in no event be liable for any damages, losses, costs, expenses and loss of profit, of whatever nature and kind, resulting from or arising out of such interference with third parties through the Internet network.

13. LOCAL RULES AND REGULATIONS

The laws and regulations of the country from which You access the Website may contain restrictions on the distribution of the information the Website contains. If this is the case, this information may not be distributed or used by any natural person or legal entity. Such natural persons and legal entities shall be obliged to inform themselves of and to observe any such restrictions.

In accordance with the obligations set out in Chapter 8 of the MIFIDPRU Sourcebook (“MIFIDPRU 8”) in the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) Handbook,  please find hereafter our MIFIDPRU 8 Disclosure.

As Ardian’ s product range comprises various funds, please read the specific disclaimers relating to these various funds.

Please also note that You can click on the following link to access Ardian’s Limited Modern Slavery Act Statement.

14. COMPLAINTS

Ardian France has established and maintains an efficient procedure for the fair and timely handling of complaints. Any complaint can be submitted at no cost to the Client Servicing via email at clientservicing@ardian.com or by postal mail to the attention of Ardian, Client servicing, 20 Place Vendôme, 75001 Paris.

We will acknowledge receipt of the complaint within a maximum of ten (10) business days from the date it was sent, unless a response is provided to within this period. Except in duly justified circumstances, a response will be provided to within two (2) months from the date the complaint was sent.

If you are not satisfied with the response to your complaint, you may, at no cost, contact the ombudsman of the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF), preferably through the electronic form available on the AMF website here or by postal mail at 17 Place de la Bourse, 75082 Paris Cedex 2.

15. CONFLICTS OF INTERESTS POLICY

Please find below Ardian’s Conflicts of Interest Policy:
Conflicts of Interest Policy

Report on the exercise of voting rights 2021

Voting policy April 2022

16. UPDATE OF THESE T&CS

Ardian reserves the right to amend these T&Cs from time to time. In such a case, Ardian shall inform You by any means Ardian deems appropriate, including for example by an announcement displayed on the Website (e.g. pop-up appearing on the Website where You access it for the first time following the amendment of the T&Cs).

In any event, You are expressly invited to regularly check these T&Cs to ensure that You are aware of any amendments thereto.
Please note that the amended T&Cs shall be deemed applicable from their date of publication on the Website and You shall be deemed bound by the amended T&Cs upon each access to the Website following the publication of the amended T&Cs thereon.

In the event You do not accept whole or part of the amendments made to the T&Cs, You must immediately stop and refrain from further using the Website and, if You are a Registered User, including the Investor Section.

17. ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS

In accordance with the provisions of Articles 1365 and subsequent of the French Civil Code, You acknowledge and agree that information exchanged between You and Ardian in electronic format (notably by email) shall be deemed valid means of proof, equivalent to information in paper format.

18. ASSIGNMENT

Ardian reserves the right to assign all or part of its rights and obligations under these T&Cs to any third party of its choice, which You hereby acknowledge and accept unconditionally.

19. SEVERABILITY

In the event any part of these T&Cs is found to be unenforceable or invalid by a competent court, such decision shall not invalidate or void the remaining provisions thereof. 

In such a case, the T&Cs shall be deemed amended to the extent necessary to render them enforceable and valid while preserving their intent.

20. GOVERNING LAW AND JURISDICTION

These T&Cs shall be governed by French law. Any claim or dispute resulting from or arising out of Your use of the Website shall be submitted to the exclusive jurisdiction of the competent courts of France.