This is the Privacy Notice of Metier Investment and Advisory Services Proprietary Limited and the members of the group of companies of which it is the holding company (referred to in this notice as “Metier”, “us” or “we”).
To access a copy of our Promotion of Access to Information Act Manual, please click here.
Our Services
When using the term “services” in this Privacy Notice, we are referring to the services that we provide as a manager of private equity investment funds through which we process, on our own behalf, the Personal Information of:
- Current and prospective investors and their representatives.
- Current and prospective portfolio companies and their representatives.
- Current and prospective service providers and their representatives.
- Counterparties to investment and divestment transactions and their representatives.
- Any other person we may interact with when conducting our business.
The term “services” does not include (and this Privacy Notice does not cover) our processing of Personal Information of job applicants, employees, or personnel (“HR data”), as the processing of HR data is addressed separately.
What is Personal Information?
When we use the term “Personal Information” in this Privacy Notice, we mean information that identifies, relates to, describes, is capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, to a living natural person or juristic person. It does not include aggregated or anonymised information that is maintained in a form that is not capable of being associated with or reasonably linked to you.
Our Collection and Use of Personal Information
The Personal Information we collect, the way we collect it, and how we use it depends on our relationship with you and how you interact with us.
Sources of Collection
We collect Personal Information about you in a variety of ways. Personal Information may be voluntarily submitted by you when using our services, such as when communicating with us or in the process of requesting and using our services. In those cases where you directly provide information to us, you are free to choose which information you want to provide to us or whether you want to provide us with information at all. However, some information, such as your name, and contact details and Personal Information may be necessary for the performance of our contractual obligations. Without providing this information, you will not be able to request or use our services or enter into a contract with us.
At times, we may collect Personal Information about you from other sources and third parties, even before our first direct interaction. For example, we may obtain some Personal Information from industry databases or other professionals in the private equity industry.
Personal Information may also be collected automatically when you visit our website, including technical information, such as your Internet Protocol (IP) address which is used to connect your computer to the Internet, operating system or browser type and platform for system information, and information about your use of our website, including details of your visits, such as pages viewed and resources that you accessed. We do not link this information to personally identifiable information about you.
Current and Prospective Investors - Collection of Personal Information
When we communicate with current investors or prospective investors, we collect Personal Information about them, which may include:
- Contact information, such as the current or prospective investor’s name, authorised representatives, email address, address, and telephone number.
- Investment information, such as the current or prospective investor’s subscription information, bank account number and information about transactions, such as capital account balances, contributions and distributions.
- Due diligence information, such as the current or prospective investor’s legal status, identifying number, national origin, and citizenship status.
Use of Personal Information
We use the Personal Information we collect about current and prospective investors to:
- Provide them with information about our firm and investments.
- Perform customer due diligence in terms of anti-money laundering laws and regulations.
- Facilitate day-to-day business operations, such as developing and monitoring investments, providing financial and accounting support, administering assets and evaluating and reviewing our business performance.
- Perform investment transactions on their behalf.
- Draw capital contributions from them.
- Pay distributions to them.
Current and Prospective Portfolio Companies - Collection of Personal Information
When we communicate with current or prospective portfolio companies, we collect Personal Information about them, which may include:
- Contact information, such as the current or prospective portfolio company’s name, authorised representatives, email address, address, and telephone number.
- Business information, such as the goods or services it provides, where it carries on business, its assets and liabilities, financial performance and reputation.
- Due diligence information, such as the current or prospective portfolio company’s legal status, identifying number and national origin.
Use of Personal Information
We use the Personal Information we collect about current and prospective portfolio companies to:
- Assess their attractiveness as potential investments.
- Monitor our investment in the portfolio company.
- Monitor corporate, environmental and social governance obligations of the portfolio company.
- Provide financial, management and other support to the portfolio company.
- Evaluate and review the performance of the portfolio company.
- Report to our investors regarding the portfolio company.
Current and Prospective Service Providers - Collection of Personal Information
When we consider purchasing goods or services from a service provider, we collect Personal Information about them, which may include:
- Contact information, such as the current or prospective service provider’s name, authorised representatives, email address, address, and telephone number.
- Business information, such as the goods or services it provides, where it carries on business, its performance and reputation.
Use of Personal Information
We use the information we collect about a service provider to:
- Obtain a service provider’s goods or services.
- Maintain our relationship with the service provider.
- Communicate with the service provider.
Counterparties (Buyers, Sellers, Partners and Co-investors) - Collection of Personal Information
When we deal with counterparties to transactions, we collect Personal Information about them, which may include:
- Contact information, such as the counterparty’s name, authorised representatives, email address, address, and telephone number.
- Business information, such as the goods or services it provides, where it carries on business, its performance and reputation.
- Due diligence information, such as the counterparty’s legal status, identifying number, national origin or citizenship status.
Use of Personal Information
We use the information we collect about counterparties to:
- Inform our decision to transact with the counterparty.
- Provide them with information about our firm and investments.
- Communicate with the counterparty regarding the transaction.
- Conduct due diligence and risk management relating to the counterparty.
- Exercise our rights or perform our obligations under the transaction.
Representatives - Collection of Personal Information
When representatives of a current or prospective investor, portfolio company, service provider or counterparty interact with us, we collect Personal Information about them, which may include:
- Contact information, such as the representative’s name, email address, and telephone number.
- Professional or employment Information, such as the representative’s employer, job title and responsibilities.
- Due diligence information, such as the representative’s employment history, reference information, national origin and citizenship.
Use of Personal Information
We use the Personal Information we collect about representatives of current or prospective investors, portfolio companies, service providers or counterparties to:
- Communicate with them.
- Maintain our relationship with the investor, portfolio company, service provider or counterparty.
Other Collection of Personal Information from Other Sources and Third Parties
We obtain Personal Information about the persons described above directly from them. We also obtain Personal Information about them from other sources, which we often combine with Personal Information we collect directly from them. We receive the same categories of Personal Information as described above from the following sources and third parties:
- Industry contacts: We may collect Personal Information such as names and contact details from other professionals in the private equity industry to perform our due diligence obligations or for business development purposes. For example, we may check investor references with other private equity fund managers.
- Information providers: We may from time to time obtain information from third-party information providers to correct or supplement Personal Information we collect. For example, we may obtain contact information and performance information from industry databases.
- Enquiry information: If a person contacts us – for example, via email or through the “Contact Us” section of our website – we may collect Personal Information in connection with that person’s enquiry and correspondence with us which may include the name, email address and telephone number as well as the job title and any further content disclosed by the individual. We may need additional information to fulfil the request or respond to the enquiry. We may provide additional privacy disclosures where the scope of the enquiry or Personal Information we require falls outside the scope of this Privacy Notice. In that case, the additional privacy disclosures will govern how we may process the information provided by the person.
- Publicly available information: We may collect Personal Information such as names and contact details and job title from publicly available sources, such as government records or publicly available websites, to supplement the Personal Information identified above.
- Information we collect automatically: If you merely visit our website, our log files may process the following information: IP address, device and browsing information such as browser type, device type, device identifiers, screen resolution, device manufacturer and model, internet service provider, referring and exit pages, date/time stamp, clickstream data, and language preferences.
Other Uses of Personal Information
In addition to the uses of Personal Information identified above, we use the Personal Information we collect to:
- Facilitate our day-to-day business operations, such as developing and monitoring investments, providing financial and accounting support, monitoring and insuring our assets, administering our services, evaluating and reviewing our business performance, analysing financial data and creating financial statements.
- Report to our investors.
- Respond to investor enquiries.
- Develop investment strategies.
- Enforce and carry out contracts and agreements.
- Comply with legal obligations.
Our Disclosure of Personal Information
We disclose Personal Information in the following ways:
- Within Metier: We exchange Personal Information among our affiliates and subsidiaries for purposes and uses that are consistent with this Privacy Notice. For example, the manager of a private equity investment fund in South Africa may disclose information concerning an investor to its Mauritius counterpart in connection with a joint investment of the Mauritius and South African funds.
- To our service providers: We engage third parties to perform certain functions on our behalf, including attorneys, auditors, banks, lenders, custodians, insurance brokers, insurance providers, IT support providers, due diligence providers and placement agents for future fundraising activities.
- For a business transaction or reorganisation: We may take part in or be involved with a corporate business transaction, such as a merger, acquisition, joint venture, or financing or sale of company assets. We may disclose Personal Information to third parties during the negotiation of or in connection with such a corporate business transaction. Personal Information may also be disclosed in the event of insolvency or business rescue proceedings.
- In accordance with our legal obligations and rights: We may disclose Personal Information to third parties, such as legal advisers and law enforcement authorities:
- in connection with the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims.
- to comply with laws (such as customer due diligence and anti-money laundering laws) or to respond to lawful requests (including those by law enforcement authorities and regulators) and legal process.
- to protect our rights and property, and the rights and property of our investors, including to enforce our agreements and policies.
- to detect, suppress, or prevent fraud.
- to reduce credit risk and collect debts owed to us.
- to protect our health and safety and health and safety of others.
- as otherwise required by applicable law.
- Otherwise with consent: We may disclose an individual’s Personal Information to certain other third parties with that individual’s consent.
Children’s Personal Information
We do process Personal Information about children, including names, dates of birth and identity numbers, when it is necessary for the services we are offering, and you provide it to us. This occurs only in the context of compliance with anti-money laundering laws, when we are required to identify the ultimate beneficial owners of an investor which is a legal person, for instance, a partnership, trust or family office. When you provide us with Personal Information of children, you consent to us processing such Personal Information for the purposes described above in your capacity as legal guardian.
Legal Bases for Processing: We rely on one or more of the following legal grounds to process Personal Information about you, whether it is obtained from you or a third party:
- The performance of a contract.
- Our legitimate interests.
- Compliance with legal obligations.
- Consent.
Data Retention
We retain Personal Information about you for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Notice, unless a longer period is required under applicable law or is needed to resolve disputes or protect our legal rights. The criteria used to determine the period for which Personal Information about you will be retained varies depending on the legal basis under which we process the Personal Information:
Legitimate Interests - Where we are processing Personal Information based on our legitimate interests, we generally will retain such information for a reasonable period of time based on the particular interest, taking into account the fundamental interests and the rights and freedoms of data subjects, but no longer than necessary for the purpose for which we process your personal data.
Consent - Where we are processing Personal Information based on your consent, we generally will retain the information for the period of time necessary to fulfil the underlying agreement with you or until you withdraw your consent.
Contract - Where we are processing Personal Information based on contract, we generally will retain the information for the duration of the contract plus some additional limited period of time that is necessary to comply with law or that represents the prescription period for legal claims that could arise from the contractual relationship.
Legal Obligation - Where we are processing Personal Information based on a legal obligation, we generally will retain the information for the period of time necessary to fulfil the legal obligation.
Legal Claim - We may need to apply a “legal hold” that retains information beyond our typical retention period where we face threat of legal action. In that case, we will retain the information until the hold is removed, which typically means the claim or threat of claim has been resolved.
In all cases, in addition to the purposes and legal bases, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the Personal Information, as well as the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your Personal Information.
International Data Transfers We may transfer Personal Information about you among our subsidiaries or affiliates, as well as to the categories of third parties identified in the Our Disclosure of Personal Information section of the Privacy Notice.
Through Microsoft Cloud storage, Personal Information may be transferred to, stored and processed in a country other than the one in which it was collected, including countries in the European Union, the Middle East, Africa and the United States of America.
Insofar as your Personal Information may be transferred out of South Africa, we will take reasonable organisational or contractual measures to ensure that your Personal Information is processed by third party service only in accordance with the purposes for which you provided it to us and that the required levels of protection have been implemented by such third-party service providers to safeguard your Personal Information.
Data Security
The Personal Information we collect from you is stored by us and/or our service providers on databases protected through a combination of physical and electronic access controls, firewall technology and other appropriate administrative, technical, personnel and physical security measures.
Nevertheless, such security measures cannot prevent all loss, misuse or alteration of Personal Information and we are not responsible for any damages or liabilities relating to any such incidents to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law and other applicable laws.
Where required under law, we will notify you of any such loss, misuse or alteration of Personal Information that may affect you, so that you can take the appropriate actions for the due protection of your rights.
Your Privacy Rights
You have the following rights in relation to your Personal Information (subject to certain limitations at law):
Access - The right to access Personal Information about you, as well as obtain further information relating to its processing.
Rectification - The right to correct or update any Personal Information about you that is inaccurate or incomplete.
Restriction of Processing - The right to require us to limit the purposes for which we process your Personal Information if the continued processing of the Personal Information in this way is not justified, such as where the accuracy of the Personal Information is contested by you.
Erasure - The right to request the erasure of Personal Information about you without undue delay if the continued processing of that Personal Information is not justified.
Portability - The right to obtain a copy of Personal Information about you in an easily accessible format and the right to have that data transmitted to another responsible party.
Objection to Processing - You also have the right to object to any processing based on our legitimate interests where there are grounds relating to your particular situation. There may be compelling reasons for continuing to process your Personal Information, and we will assess and inform you if that is the case. You can object to marketing activities for any reason.
Please note that if the exercise of these rights limits our ability to process Personal Information, we may not be able to provide our services to you, or otherwise engage with you going forward.
Right to Withdraw Consent
Where we rely on your consent for processing of your Personal Information, you also have the right to withdraw your consent to such processing at any time and with effect for the future, subject to certain limitations at law.
You may withdraw your consent in the following ways:
- Please contact us as set forth in the Contact Us section below;
- Where we send marketing communication to you, you may also withdraw your consent by notifying us accordingly.
Submitting Requests
To submit a request, please contact us as set forth in the Contact Us section below. We may need to verify your identity before processing your request, which may require us to obtain additional Personal Information from you. In certain circumstances, we may decline a request to exercise the rights described above.
Right to Lodge a Complaint
If you have any complaints regarding our privacy practices, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator at the following email address complaints.IR@justice.gov.za.
If you have any questions or requests in connection with this Notice or other privacy-related matters, please send an email addressed to the Chief Executive Officer of Metier Investment and Advisory Services (Pty) Ltd (info@metier.co.za).
Alternatively, inquiries may be addressed to: Metier Investment and Advisory Services (Pty) Ltd 4th Floor Building 3 Oxford Parks 8 Parks Boulevard Dunkeld Johannesburg 2196 South Africa
For the attention of the CEO.
Notification of Changes
We reserve the right to change this Privacy Notice from time to time, and in our sole discretion. We may send you a notice regarding material changes to this Privacy Notice, but we encourage you to frequently check this Privacy Notice for any changes. Your continued use of the services after any change in this Privacy Policy will constitute your acceptance of such changes.
If this Privacy Notice or any provision in this Privacy Notice is regulated by or subject to the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 ("POPI") or other data protection legislation it is not intended that any provision of this Privacy Notice contravenes any provision of POPI or other data protection legislation. Therefore, all provisions of this Privacy Notice must be treated as being qualified, to the extent necessary, to ensure that the provisions of POPI or other data protection legislation are complied with.
© 2022 Metier. All Rights Reserved. Metier’s Promotion of Access to Information manual is available on request. Metier Private Equity (Pty) Ltd, Lereko Metier Sustainable Capital Managers (Pty) Ltd and Metier Sustainable Capital Managers (Pty) Ltd are licenced Financial Services Providers (Licence No: 44882, Licence No: 44430 and Licence No: 48547 respectively) in terms of the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services Act, 37 of 2002 and have Conflict of Interest Management Policies as required in terms of Section 3A of the General Code of Conduct.