Bengs Lab

Data is the new epicentre of innovation

There is neither wealth nor strength than data Modern corolary of an analysis of Jean Bodin who made a link between population increase and society wealth

You simply need to watch the financial valorization of the GAFAM and NATU and to compare them to their historical profitability to face the facts: their value doesn’t rely on the visible service they offer, but on the aggregation of mass data for which they optimize availability on one side and its value on the other side by inventing new industries, new products, new services, new concepts or even more relevant consumption use.

Most companies depend on their assets, more or less in use, their patents, more or less protected, their knowledge, more or less accurate, their network, more or less efficient, their value chain, more or less optimized. However those who want to survive try to integrate data within their business model, or at least to collect and aggregate a multitude of data sometimes in an unsystematic way. It is hard to imagine how these aggregates can generate additional economic value themselves!

If the data we have has no value for us, would it be valuable for someone else ? However, are we able to bring value to a series of external data that is far from our core business ? How can companies reorganise themselves around data? What could be the optimal organisation to maximize the value of its data?

For example when an insurance company starts to integrate thousands of behavioural data sets to adjust their insurance premium accordingly to a very precise differentiation of client types and uses, does that mean that this company is going to break from the market habits and become a leader at the expense of its competitors ? What are the prerequisites to gather in order to bring value to these data sets which as soon as they are combined, transformed, enriched… become more and more valuable to actors that are willing to pay a high price?

If new entrants can disrupt entire ecosystems with data, how large corporations can rethink their organization around data? What could be the best optimized organization to maximize data value ?