Do I keep all intellectual property rights for my product idea?
A: Yes, you keep 100% ownership of all of your intellectual property. See section 6.0 below for more details.
Q: Will proprietary information I share be kept confidential? Can I get you to sign an NDA?
A: Anything you share in the private areas of the Academy is kept strictly confidential and is protected by an NDA section in the agreement below. Any information you share in the open areas of the Academy community is not kept confidential and other members can see it, but it is still kept hidden from Google and the general public. All information shared in private mentoring is kept strictly confidential and remains 100% your IP. See section 6.0 below for more details.
Q: Can I cancel at anytime?
A: Yes, you can cancel at any time with just a few mouse clicks. See section 5.0 below for more details.
Can I get a refund if I’m not happy with it?
A: Yes, we offer a full refund within the first 30 days for all Hardware Academy. For the Private Mentoring program we offer a pro-rated refund within the first 14 days. See section 5.0 below for more details.
THE FULL TERMS AND CONDITIONS YOU AGREE TO WHEN JOINING THE HARDWARE ACADEMY ARE OUTLINED BELOW:
1.0 OVERVIEW
The terms “we,” “us,” and “our” refer to Predictable Designs LLC. The term the “Site” refers to thehardwareacademy.com. The terms “user,” “you,” and “your” refer to site visitors, customers, members and any other users of the site.
2.0 SERVICE
The Hardware Academy is a site that provides engineering support, entrepreneurial coaching, training courses, and resources for entrepreneurs and startups developing new hardware products (the “Service”).
We also package up some limited resources from the Hardware Academy and make them available as stand-alone bundles called Hardware Hack Packs. These bundle packs are purchased for a one-time fee, whereas the full Hardware Academy is billed on a recurring basis. Inside the full Hardware Academy you get access to a team of experts to answer all of your questions, and you get full access to all of our courses and resources.
Use of TheHardwareAcademy.com, including all materials presented herein and all online services provided by Predictable Designs LLC, is subject to the following Terms and Conditions. These Terms and Conditions apply to all site visitors, customers, and all other users of the site. By using the Site or Service, you agree to these Terms and Conditions, without modification, and acknowledge reading them.
Parties agree that the Service is in the nature of education. The scope of services provided by Predictable Designs LLC according to this Agreement are limited to those listed on TheHardwareAcademy.com website. Predictable Designs LLC reserves the right to substitute services equal to or comparable to the services listed if the need arises, without prior notice.
The Hardware Academy is available with three tiers or plans. Please see here for the specifics of what each plan includes.
A basic description for each tier is as follows:
Standard – Full access to all content and the open community but without any private support. Includes discounts on various products and services from other suppliers.
Pro – Full access to all content and the open community plus access to private areas for consulting with John Teel.
Premium – Full access to all content and the open community plus access to private areas for consulting with John Teel and engineering support.
The private engineering support does not include any design work such creating a schematic circuit diagram, PCB layout, 3D model, and so on. It does not include any lab work or in-depth design reviews (must be purchased separately).
The private engineering support does include getting feedback and quick reviews of your design, as well as help selecting components, getting design suggestions, help debugging problems, and overall engineering advice.
All private engineering support is kept strictly confidential. All communication will happen in a private forum where you can only see your own posts. We have NDA’s in place with all engineers permitted in this private area so all of your proprietary information is kept strictly confidential and remains 100% your intellectual property.
Private 1:1 Mentoring – With this program you get private access to John Teel via video, audio, email, private forum, and/or Whatsapp. This program also includes a Private Pro plan membership for the Academy. Everything shared with John Teel in the Private Mentoring program is kept strictly confidential.
3.0 UPGRADES / DOWNGRADES
You may upgrade and downgrade between these plans as needed. However, it is expected that you intend to stay on the new plan for at least 3 months. Upgrading to a higher plan just to briefly take advantage of the additional support and discounts before downgrading again is not permitted.
When downgrading you will get the price in effect at the time when you first joined (grandfathered price) which many times will be lower than the current price for new members.
When upgrading you will always have to pay the current rate for that plan.
4.0 PAYMENTS
All payments are made on an automatic recurring basis until you cancel your subscription. If you join on a monthly plan you will be billed every 30 days. If you join on a semi-annual plan you will be billed every 180 days. If you join on an annual plan then you will be billed every 365 days.
Under no circumstances will the price at which you joined ever be increased regardless of the current price for new members. If you cancel your membership and then rejoin later you will be required to pay the current rate and you will lose any grandfathered discount.
5.0 CANCELLATIONS & REFUNDS
We offer a 30 day money back guarantee on the Standard plan should you be unhappy with the Service in your first month of membership.
For the Private pro plan we do not offer a money back guarantee if paying on a monthly subscription. If that is a concern you may wish to start by joining the Standard plan.
For the Private Pro plan if paying on an annual basis we offer a pro-rated refund on the unused portion of your subscription if requested within the first 30 days.
For the Private 1:1 Mentoring program any refund request within the first 14 days for private mentoring will be pro-rated. No refunds after the first 14 days will be given. See section 5.0 below for more details.
To request a refund please contact support at https://thehardwareacademy.com/contact-support or email support@thehardwareacademy.com.
You may also cancel your monthly subscription at any time via your account page, but due to the nature of the Service no refunds will be made for any membership fees already paid, excluding the 30 day money back guarantee as stated above.
Once you cancel you will no longer have access to the Service, including all content and community resources, once your current membership period is completed.
The 30 day refund period only applies to your first subscription and cannot be used more than once.
No partial refunds are given outside of the initial 30 days should you terminate an annual subscription before your renewal date, however you will retain access to the Service until the end of your annual payment term.
It is entirely your responsibility to ensure that you cancel your account in good time should you no longer require the Service and do not wish to be billed further.
6.0 INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS TO YOUR MATERIALS
We claim no intellectual property rights over the material you supply to Predictable Designs LLC. You retain copyright, trademark, and patent rights that you may rightfully hold in any content that you submit through the Site or Service. Content you submit to Predictable Designs LLC remains yours to the extent that you have any legal claims therein.
You agree to hold Predictable Designs LLC harmless from and against all claims, liabilities, and expenses arising out of any potential or actual copyright, trademark, or patent misappropriation or infringement claimed against you.
Inside the Hardware Academy there is a Community area divided into two areas: Open and Private.
Any information you share in the Open area of the Community is visible to all members of the Academy and is NOT confidential. You agree to hold Predictable Designs LLC harmless from and against all claims related to information you share in the Open area of the community.
Any Proprietary Information about your product or business that you supply directly to Predictable Designs LLC, or that you share in the private areas of the community, or via the private mentoring, is kept strictly confidential and will remain 100% your intellectual property.
Private group programs: If you participate in one of our small private group coaching programs (sold separately) then all participants must agree to keep any proprietary information shared by other members of the group strictly confidential. Predictable Designs will keep any proprietary information shared in these private groups strictly confidential. Although we require all participants to agree to keep proprietary information confidential, Predictable Designs can not be held liable for any breach of privacy by another participant.
In consideration of the disclosure of Proprietary Information Predictable Designs LLC hereby agrees: (i) to hold the Proprietary Information in strict confidence and to take all reasonable precautions to protect such Proprietary Information, (ii) not to purposefully disclose any such Proprietary Information or any information derived therefrom to any third person, (iii) not to make any use whatsoever at any time of such Proprietary Information, and (iv) not to copy or reverse engineer any such Proprietary Information. Predictable Designs LLC shall procure that its employees, agents and sub-contractors to whom Proprietary Information is disclosed or who have access to Proprietary Information sign a nondisclosure or similar agreement in content substantially similar to this Agreement
You consent to recordings being made of live group calls or workshops provided as part of the Service which may then be used by Predictable Designs LLC for promotional, business development, and marketing purposes, without compensation to you. At no time will this include sharing any proprietary information which you have shared confidentially with Predictable Designs LLC.
7.0 USE OF THE SITE AND SERVICE
To access or use the Site, you must be 18 years of age or older and have the requisite power and authority to enter into these Terms and Conditions. Children under the age of 18 are prohibited from using the Site. Information provided on the Site and in the Service are subject to change. Predictable Designs LLC makes no representation or warranty that the information provided, regardless of its source (the “Content”), is accurate, complete, reliable, current, or error-free. Predictable Designs LLC disclaims all liability for any inaccuracy, error, or incompleteness in the Content.
8.0 ACCOUNT CREATION
In order to use the Service, you will be required to provide information about yourself including your name, email address, username and password, and other personal information. You agree that any registration information you give to Predictable Designs LLC will always be accurate, correct, and up to date. You must not impersonate someone else or provide account information or an email address other than your own. Your account must not be used for any illegal or unauthorized purpose. You must not, in the use of the Service, violate any laws in your jurisdiction.
9.0 LAWFUL PURPOSES
You may use the Site and Service for lawful purposes only. You agree to be financially responsible for all purchases made by you or someone acting on your behalf through the Site. You agree to use the Site and to purchase services or products through the Site for legitimate purposes only. You shall not post or transmit through the Site any material which violates or infringes the rights of others, or which is threatening, abusive, defamatory, libelous, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, vulgar, obscene, profane, or otherwise objectionable, contains injurious formulas, recipes, or instructions, which encourages conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability, or otherwise violate any law.
10.0 REFUSAL OF SERVICE
The Services are offered subject to our acceptance of your order or requests. We reserve the right to refuse service to any order, person or entity, without the obligation to assign reason for doing so. No order is deemed accepted by us until payment has been processed. We also have the right to refuse service after payment is made, but we will then issue a full refund.
11.0 ORDER CONFIRMATION
We will email you to confirm the placement of your order and with details concerning product delivery and ongoing payments. In the event that there is an error in this email confirmation, it is your responsibility to inform us as soon as possible.
12.0 DURATION OF AGREEMENT
Once confirmed, we will provide you access to the purchased Service. You agree and understand that access to the Service may at times be influenced and affected by third parties that we use to provide the Service (web hosting, membership site plugins, etc.). You agree and understand that no breach of contract action may be initiated against Predictable Designs LLC when there are reasonable delays in the access of the Service.
Predictable Designs LLC reserves the right to terminate the Service, and or access to certain features of the Service, with or without prior notice to you. We will make reasonable efforts to provide notice but is not required to do so under the terms of this agreement.
If the service is terminated by Predictable Designs LLC then you will be refunded a pro-rated amount for the time remaining on your subscription period.
If for any reason, Predictable Designs LLC should dissolve or cease to exist, then your access to the Service terminates.
If you are paying on a monthly subscription this allows you access to the Service for 30 days. Failure to pay your monthly subscription payment will result in access to the Service being stopped.
If you are paying on a semi-annual subscription this allows you access to the Service for 180 days. Failure to pay your semi-annual subscription payment will result in access to the Service being stopped.
For annual subscriptions you will receive 365 days access. You may cancel the automatic renewal of your annual subscription at any time and your access to the Site will end at the end of the current contracted term.
For lifetime plans, you will have access for as long as the Service is available.
13.0 SERVICE DESCRIPTION
We endeavor to describe and display the Service as accurately as possible. While we try to be as clear as possible in explaining the Service, please do not accept that the Site is entirely accurate, current, or error-free. From time to time we may correct errors in pricing and descriptions. We reserve the right to refuse or cancel any order with an incorrect price listing.
14.0 MATERIAL YOU SUBMIT TO THE SITE
You shall not upload, post or otherwise make available on the Site any artwork, photos, or other materials (collectively “Materials”) protected by copyright, trademark, or other proprietary right without the express written permission of the owner of the copyright, trademark, or other proprietary right, and the burden of determining that any Materials are not so protected rests entirely with you. You shall be liable for any damage resulting from any infringement of copyrights, trademarks, or other proprietary rights, or any other harm resulting from such a submission. For all Materials submitted by you to the Site, you automatically represent or warrant that you have the authority to use and distribute the Materials, and that the use or display of the Materials will not violate any laws, rules, regulations, or rights of third parties.
As a feature of the Service, Predictable Designs LLC provides access to a community forum in conjunction with the Service. Predictable Designs LLC has complete discretion with regards to the platform, and the nature of the interaction, dependent on the Service.
You agree that your use of these community is a privilege and Predictable Designs LLC may limit or deny access to these platforms for misconduct that includes but is not limited to being inappropriate, rude, violent, or threatening. Predictable Designs LLC will make reasonable efforts to provide notice to you with regards to inappropriate or unapproved content (including sex related products) that you have placed within the voluntarily provided community and social media platform. Predictable Designs LLC is not required to provide notice, and reserves all rights to take immediate and appropriate action to protect the Predictable Designs LLC’s brand and image integrity.
15.0 OUR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
The Site and Service contain intellectual property owned by Predictable Designs LLC, including trademarks, copyrights, proprietary information, and other intellectual property. Predictable Designs LLC’s copyrighted and original materials are provided to you as part of the Service for your individual use only and a single-user license. All intellectual property, including Predictable Designs LLC’s copyrighted materials shall remain the sole property of Predictable Designs LLC. No license to sell or distribute our materials is granted or implied.
You may not modify, publish, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, create derivative works from, distribute, display, reproduce or perform, or in any way exploit in any format whatsoever any of the Site or Service Content or intellectual property, in whole or in part, without our prior written consent. This includes but is not limited to sharing material with others, posting excerpts of material on any social media, blogging about the material, or in any other way that would reasonably appear to share the Site or Service’s information with a non-member. We reserve the right to immediately remove you from the Service, without refund, if you are caught violating this intellectual property policy. This does not include the reasonable sharing of things you have learned in the Academy, and this clause is only aimed at those attempting to compete with Predictable Designs LLC and violate our intellectual property.
16.0 CHANGED TERMS
We may at any time amend these Terms and Conditions. Such amendments are effective immediately upon notice to you by us posting the new Terms and Conditions on this Site. Any use of the Site or Service by you after being notified means you accept these amendments. We reserve the right to update any portion of our Site and Service, including these Terms and Conditions, at any time. We will post the most recent versions to the Site and list the effective dates on the pages of our Terms and Conditions.
17.0 LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
YOU AGREE THAT UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL WE BE LIABLE FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, PUNITIVE, EXEMPLARY, OR ANY OTHER DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF YOUR USE OF THE SITE OR SERVICE. ADDITIONALLY, PREDICTABLE DESIGNS LLC IS NOT LIABLE FOR DAMAGES IN CONNECTION WITH (I) ANY FAILURE OF PERFORMANCE, ERROR, OMISSION, DENIAL OF SERVICE, ATTACK, INTERRUPTION, DELETION, DEFECT, DELAY IN OPERATION OR TRANSMISSION, COMPUTER VIRUS, OR LINE OR SYSTEM FAILURE; (II) LOSS OF REVENUE, ANTICIPATED PROFITS, BUSINESS, SAVINGS, GOODWILL OR DATA; AND (III) THIRD PARTY THEFT OF, DESTRUCTION OF, UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO, ALTERATION OF, OR USE OF YOUR INFORMATION OR PROPERTY, REGARDLESS OF OUR NEGLIGENCE, GROSS NEGLIGENCE, FAILURE OF AN ESSENTIAL PURPOSE AND WHETHER SUCH LIABILITY ARISES IN NEGLIGENCE, CONTRACT, TORT, OR ANY OTHER THEORY OF LEGAL LIABILITY. THE FOREGOING APPLIES EVEN IF PREDICTABLE DESIGNS LLC HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF OR COULD HAVE FORESEEN THE DAMAGES. IN THOSE STATES THAT DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF LIABILITY FOR THE DAMAGES, OUR LIABILITY IS LIMITED TO THE FULLEST POSSIBLE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW. IN NO EVENT SHALL PREDICTABLE DESIGNS LLC’S CUMULATIVE LIABILITY TO YOU EXCEED THE TOTAL PURCHASE PRICE OF THE SERVICE YOU HAVE PURCHASED FROM PREDICTABLE DESIGNS LLC, AND IF NO PURCHASE HAS BEEN MADE BY YOU PREDICTABLE DESIGNS LLC’S CUMULATIVE LIABILITY TO YOU SHALL NOT EXCEED $100.
18.0 THIRD PARTY RESOURCES
The Site and the Service may contain links to third party websites and resources. You acknowledge and agree that we are not responsible or liable for the availability, accuracy, content, or policies of third party websites or resources. Links to such websites or resources do not imply any endorsement by or affiliation with Predictable Designs LLC. You acknowledge sole responsibility for and assume all risk arising from your use of any such websites or resources.
19.0 INDEMNIFICATION
You shall indemnify and hold us harmless from and against any and all losses, damages, settlements, liabilities, costs, charges, assessments, and expenses, as well as third party claims and causes of action, including, without limitation, attorney’s fees, arising out of any breach by you of any of these Terms and Conditions, or any use by you of the Site or Service. You shall provide us with such assistance, without charge, as we may request in connection with any such defense, including, without limitation, providing us with such information, documents, records, and reasonable access to you, as we deem necessary. You shall not settle any third party claim or waive any defense without our prior written consent.
Some of the resources available in the Hardware Academy include legal document templates and resources. Under no circumstances shall these resources be considered as providing legal advice. All legal templates and resources are to be considered preliminary and should be reviewed by an attorney before final use. Under no circumstances shall Predictable Designs LLC be held liable for any damages arriving from their use. All legal documents are for entertainment purposes only.
20.0 EFFECT OF HEADINGS
The subject headings of the paragraphs and subparagraphs of this Agreement are included for convenience only and shall not affect the construction or interpretation of any of its provisions.
21.0 ENTIRE AGREEMENT; WAIVER
This Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between you and Predictable Designs LLC pertaining to the Site and Service and supersedes all prior and contemporaneous agreements, representations, and understandings between us. No waiver of any of the provisions of this Agreement by Predictable Designs LLC shall be deemed, or shall constitute, a waiver of any other provision, whether or not similar, nor shall any waiver constitute a continuing waiver. No waiver shall be binding unless executed in writing by Predictable Designs LLC.
22.0 NOTICES
All notices, requests, demands, and other communications under this Agreement shall be in writing and properly addressed as follows:
Predictable Designs LLC
10645 N. Oracle Rd., Suite 121-117
Oro Valley, Arizona 85737 USA
23.0 RECOVERY OF LITIGATION EXPENSES
If any legal action or any arbitration or other proceeding is brought for the enforcement of this Agreement, or because of an alleged dispute, breach, default, or misrepresentation in connection with any of the provisions of this Agreement, the successful or prevailing party or parties shall be entitled to recover reasonable attorney’s fees and other costs incurred in that action or proceeding, in addition to any other relief to which it or they may be entitled.
24.0 SEVERABILITY
If any term, provision, covenant, or condition of this Agreement is held by an arbitrator or court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, void, or unenforceable, the rest of the Agreement shall remain in full force and effect and shall in no way be affected, impaired, or invalidated.
Also see our privacy policy here.
