An explosion of data is revolutionizing business practices. The availability of new data sources and delivery models provides unprecedented insights into customer and partner behavior and enables much improved capacity to understand and optimize business processes and operations. Real time data allows companies to fine tune inventories and in-store product placement; it allows restaurants to know what a customer will order, even before they read the menu or reach the counter. And, data is also the foundation for new services offerings for companies like John Deere or BMW or Starwood.

That data explosion has given rise to a new market for data and data services, the data economy. I’ve previously written about the role of data brokers in driving the new data economy.  These new data providers allow companies to expand the sources they use, bringing in more external data to complement internal data sources. In order to compete in an increasingly competitive, and data-driven world companies will need to expand their use of external data. They need to “double down” on their investments in information.  But how?  Our new report, Navigating The New Data Market Landscape, goes into much more detail on the players in the new data economy. It aims to arm CIOs and other tech management professionals with the knowledge they need to inform their new data strategy, in particular incorporating external data into their business intelligence and decision-making. The data economy is up and running with an increasing selection of data providers open for business.