Terms of Service

Effective 18 September 2026 · LightPath, operated by Mink LLC, St. Louis, Missouri

These Terms of Service ("Terms") govern your access to and use of every service offered by LightPath, a business of Mink LLC ("LightPath", "we", "us"). That includes this website, our consulting, training and development work, our software products and hosted platforms, and our support services (together, the "Services"). "You" means the person or organisation using the Services. If you accept these Terms for an organisation, you confirm you are authorised to bind it.

By using any Service, signing a proposal or statement of work, paying an invoice, or creating an account, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Services.

1. The Services we offer

LightPath is an applied-AI consultancy, development studio and software provider. The Services include:

• Strategy and advisory: AI strategy and roadmaps, discovery and workflow mapping, functional specifications, vendor and model selection, AI policy, risk and governance frameworks.
• Enablement: training for leaders and teams, adoption and change-management programmes.
• Custom builds: custom AI solutions, chatbots, copilots, agentic automation, internal tools, websites, integrations, digital transformation and full-stack platform development, with launch, support and ongoing improvement.
• Software products and hosted platforms: including HypeWriter, TheHypeThing, the AI Newsroom, contractor quoting and payments, the ManageMink platform and its modules, and any other product we make available (each a "Product").
• Managed services: content systems (SEO, newsletters, social and video pipelines), email delivery, social media publishing, forms, subscription billing and invoicing, hosting, maintenance and technical support.

We may add, change or retire Services and features over time. If a change materially reduces a paid Service you rely on, we will tell you in advance where reasonably possible.

2. How these Terms fit with your agreement

Paid engagements are usually described in a proposal, quote, statement of work, order form, subscription plan or invoice (an "Order"). If an Order conflicts with these Terms, the Order controls for that engagement. Some Products have their own terms on their websites; for that Product, its own terms control where they conflict with these. Our Privacy Policy forms part of these Terms.

3. Accounts and security

• You must give accurate information, keep credentials, API keys and tokens confidential, and tell us promptly about any unauthorised use.
• You are responsible for everything done under your accounts and keys, including by your staff, contractors and systems.
• Keep login details and keys out of email, chat and shared documents. We will never ask for your password.
• You must be at least 18 years old and able to form a binding contract.

4. Consulting, strategy and training

• We perform professional services with reasonable skill and care, in line with the Order.
• Recommendations, roadmaps, frameworks and training are guidance based on the information you give us. You decide whether and how to act on them.
• We do not provide legal, tax, accounting, financial, medical or other regulated professional advice. AI policy and governance work helps you organise decisions; it does not replace advice from your own qualified advisers.
• Estimates of time savings, cost reductions or delivery speed are good-faith projections, not guarantees.

5. Custom development and platform builds

• Scope. Work follows the Order and any agreed functional specification. Changes in scope may change timelines and fees; we will agree them with you before proceeding.
• Your cooperation. On-time delivery depends on timely access, content, decisions, feedback and approvals from you. Delays on your side may move dates.
• Acceptance. Deliverables are accepted when you approve them, use them in production, or do not report a material non-conformity within ten (10) business days of delivery, whichever comes first. We will fix reported non-conformities within the agreed scope.
• Launch and support. Post-launch support, maintenance, hosting and improvements are included only as stated in the Order or a support plan.
• Open tooling. We build on standard and open-source tools. Open-source components remain under their own licences, which we will identify on request.

6. Software products and hosted platforms

• Subject to these Terms and payment of applicable fees, we grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and use a Product for your internal business purposes during your subscription or permitted-use period.
• You may not copy, resell, sublicense, reverse engineer (except where law allows), or build a competing product from a Product, or bypass its security, rate limits or usage limits.
• We aim for high availability but do not guarantee uninterrupted or error-free operation. Planned maintenance, third-party outages and events outside our control can interrupt service. Any service levels apply only if stated in your Order.
• Beta, preview, trial or "simulated" features are provided as-is, may change or end at any time, and are excluded from any service levels.

7. Managed services: email, social, forms, billing, support

Email and newsletters

You are the sender of messages we send for you. You must have a lawful basis and any required consent to contact recipients, honour unsubscribe requests, and comply with anti-spam and marketing laws (including CAN-SPAM, and GDPR, PECR or CASL where they apply). We may pause sending to protect deliverability or comply with our providers' rules.

Social media publishing

You may connect only accounts you own or are authorised to manage. You authorise us to publish the content you, or your authorised users and systems, approve, to the channels you choose, at the times you choose. You are responsible for that content and for following each network's terms and policies. Networks may change or withdraw their APIs, limit reach, or reject posts; we are not responsible for their decisions. Disconnecting an account stops future posting but does not delete content already published on a network.

Forms and lead capture

You are responsible for the forms you publish, the data they collect, and telling visitors how you will use it.

Billing, invoicing and payments

Where we provide invoicing or subscription tools for your business, payments are processed by third-party processors such as Stripe under their own terms. We do not hold card details. You are responsible for your prices, taxes, refunds and your contracts with your customers.

Support

Support is provided through lightpath.ai/support and the channels named in your Order, during our normal business hours unless otherwise agreed. Response targets in an Order are targets, not guarantees, unless stated as a service level.

8. AI features and AI-generated output

• Some Services use artificial intelligence, including third-party models, to generate text, images, code, captions, analysis or other material ("Output").
• AI Output can be inaccurate, incomplete, biased or similar to other material. Review Output before relying on it, publishing it or sending it, especially for legal, financial, medical, safety or other high-stakes uses. Where our Services include approval steps, those steps exist so a person reviews before anything goes out.
• As between you and us, and subject to payment of fees and the third-party model terms, you own the Output you generate through the Services. We make no promise that Output is unique or protectable.
• We do not use your confidential content to train third-party models without your permission. Third-party model providers process data under their own terms, which we choose with privacy in mind.
• You must not use AI features to create unlawful, deceptive, infringing, harassing or harmful material, or to impersonate others.

9. Fees, invoices and subscriptions

• Fees. You agree to pay the fees in your Order. Unless stated otherwise, fees are in US dollars and exclude taxes, which you will pay (other than taxes on our income).
• Invoices. Invoices are due within fifteen (15) days of issue unless the Order says otherwise. Deposits and milestone payments are due before the related work begins.
• Subscriptions renew automatically for the same period until cancelled. You may cancel before the next renewal date; cancellation takes effect at the end of the current period. We will notify you of price changes at least thirty (30) days before they apply to your next renewal.
• Late payment. Overdue amounts may accrue interest at 1.5% per month or the maximum lawful rate, whichever is lower, and we may suspend Services after written notice.
• Refunds. Fees are non-refundable except where required by law or stated in your Order. If we terminate a subscription for convenience, we will refund prepaid fees for the unused period.
• Third-party costs such as hosting, domains, model usage, paid APIs, advertising spend and network or messaging fees are yours unless the Order includes them.
• Disputes. Tell us about any invoice dispute in good faith within fifteen (15) days; pay the undisputed portion on time.

10. Ownership and licences

• Custom deliverables. When you have paid in full, you own the custom deliverables we create specifically for you under an Order, including custom code, designs and documentation. Until then, you have a licence to use them for the purposes of the engagement.
• Our pre-existing materials. We keep ownership of our platform core, tools, libraries, templates, know-how and anything we created before or outside your engagement ("LightPath Materials"). Where LightPath Materials are included in your deliverables, you receive a perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to use, copy and modify them as part of those deliverables.
• Products. We and our licensors own the Products. Except for the rights granted in these Terms, no rights are transferred.
• Feedback. You may give us suggestions; we may use them without obligation to you.
• Portfolio. Unless you tell us otherwise in writing, we may name you as a client and describe the work in general terms, without disclosing your confidential information.

11. Your content and data

• You keep all rights in the content, data and materials you provide or upload ("Your Content").
• You grant us a licence to host, copy, process, transmit and display Your Content only as needed to provide and support the Services, and as you direct (for example, publishing a post you approved).
• You confirm you have the rights and permissions needed for Your Content and our use of it under these Terms.
• We handle personal data as described in our Privacy Policy. Where we process personal data on your behalf, we act as your processor and will, on request, sign a reasonable data processing agreement.
• On termination, you may export Your Content for thirty (30) days, after which we may delete it, except where the law requires us to keep it.

12. Confidentiality

Each party will protect the other's non-public business, technical and financial information with at least reasonable care, use it only for the engagement, and share it only with people who need to know it and are bound by similar duties. This does not cover information that is public, already known, independently developed or lawfully received from someone else, or disclosures the law requires (with notice where allowed). These duties last three (3) years after the engagement ends, and indefinitely for trade secrets and credentials.

13. Third-party services

The Services connect to or rely on third parties, such as cloud hosts, AI model providers, payment processors, email delivery providers and social networks. Your use of those services is governed by their terms, and we are not responsible for their availability, changes, fees or actions. Links to third-party sites are for convenience only.

14. Acceptable use

You must not use the Services to:

• break any law, or infringe anyone's intellectual property, privacy or publicity rights;
• send spam, run phishing, or send unsolicited bulk messages;
• publish content that is defamatory, harassing, hateful, sexually exploitative, deceptive or dangerous;
• distribute malware, probe or attack systems, or bypass security, authentication or usage limits;
• scrape or harvest data from the Services, or overload them;
• impersonate any person or organisation, or misrepresent AI Output as human-made where that would mislead;
• make automated decisions with legal or similarly significant effects on people without appropriate human review and legal compliance.

We may remove content or suspend access that breaks this section, with notice where reasonable.

15. Warranties and disclaimers

Each party confirms it has the authority to enter into these Terms. We will perform paid Services in a professional manner consistent with generally accepted industry standards. If we do not, tell us within thirty (30) days and we will re-perform the affected work or, if we cannot, refund the fees paid for it. That is your exclusive remedy for breach of this warranty.

Except as stated above, the Services, Products and all Output are provided "as is" and "as available". To the fullest extent the law allows, we disclaim all other warranties, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, non-infringement, accuracy and uninterrupted or error-free operation.

16. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows: (a) neither party is liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, data or goodwill, even if advised of the possibility; and (b) each party's total liability arising from or relating to the Services or these Terms is limited to the fees you paid us for the Service giving rise to the claim in the twelve (12) months before the event.

These limits do not apply to your payment obligations, a party's indemnity obligations, breach of confidentiality, or liability that cannot be limited by law (such as for fraud, gross negligence or wilful misconduct).

17. Indemnification

You will defend and indemnify LightPath, Mink LLC and their personnel against third-party claims arising from Your Content, your products and services, content you approve for publication or sending, or your breach of these Terms or the law. We will defend and indemnify you against third-party claims that custom deliverables we created (excluding Your Content, third-party and open-source components, and your modifications) infringe a US copyright or misappropriate a trade secret. The indemnified party must give prompt notice, reasonable cooperation and control of the defence to the indemnifying party.

18. Term, suspension and termination

• These Terms apply while you use any Service. Each Order runs for the term it states.
• Either party may terminate an Order if the other materially breaches it and does not cure within thirty (30) days of written notice (ten (10) days for non-payment).
• We may suspend Services immediately if needed to prevent harm, security risk, legal violation or abuse, and will restore them once the issue is resolved.
• On termination you will pay for work performed and fees accrued up to the termination date. Sections that by their nature should survive (including fees owed, ownership, confidentiality, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnification and governing law) survive.

19. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Missouri, USA, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Before starting any legal proceeding, the parties will try in good faith to resolve a dispute by negotiation for at least thirty (30) days after written notice. Any proceeding will be brought exclusively in the state or federal courts located in St. Louis County or the City of St. Louis, Missouri, and each party consents to that jurisdiction. Either party may seek urgent injunctive relief in any competent court to protect its intellectual property or confidential information.

20. General terms

• Changes. We may update these Terms. We will post the new version here with a new effective date and, for material changes affecting paid Services, notify you in advance. Continued use after the effective date means you accept the update. Changes do not alter a signed Order during its current term.
• Independent contractors. The parties are independent. Nothing creates a partnership, employment or agency relationship.
• Non-solicitation. During an engagement and for twelve (12) months afterwards, neither party will directly solicit for employment the other's personnel who worked on the engagement, except through general advertising.
• Force majeure. Neither party is liable for delays caused by events beyond its reasonable control, such as outages of third-party providers, natural disasters, war, labour disputes or government action.
• Assignment. You may not assign these Terms without our consent. We may assign them in connection with a merger, acquisition or sale of the relevant business.
• Notices. We may give notice by email to your account or billing contact. You may give notice through lightpath.ai/support.
• Entire agreement. These Terms, your Orders and our Privacy Policy are the entire agreement on their subject and replace earlier discussions. If any provision is unenforceable, the rest remains in effect. Failing to enforce a provision is not a waiver.
• Export and sanctions. You will comply with applicable export control and sanctions laws.

21. Contact

Questions about these Terms: lightpath.ai/support.