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More than 2.5 quintillion bytes of data are generated every day, of which 90% was generated in the last two years. With this explosive amount of data generation, data marketplaces have immense potential to create new revenue streams by productizing data assets.

Data marketplaces are displacing old data sharing models and significantly altering the way consumers transact with data. They unify governance, Big Data, and security tools into a common, seamless data supply chain. Three different types of data marketplaces monetize data assets: personal data marketplaces, business data marketplaces, and internet of things (IoT) sensor data marketplaces. Enterprises need to develop a clear understanding of the diverse processes and dataset requirements for each type of data asset. Further, data providers need to adopt a strong strategy around their target customers and the types of value-added data and services they want.

Data marketplaces enable the creation of new digital services and business models. They also address data valuation by taking a free-market approach, allowing data owners to set their prices and buyers to choose from whom to purchase data among the various multichannels and platforms. With data marketplace adoption continuing to grow, multiple revenue models will evolve in the short and midterm. Marketplaces usually take a commission for each data transaction and charge fees for data marketplace membership, data products listing, storage space, or use of data services. Freemium revenue models also exist, and shifts in data marketplace utilization have already commenced. For example, Snowflake Data Marketplace has users accessing more than 350 datasets from 120-plus data providers, including Heap Analytics, Knoema, FactSet, and Weather Source, across 16 key categories.