Big data, big opportunities

In my opinion, open public data could give entrepreneurs opportunities to build new services. In October 2012, I responded to an announcement that more data would be made freely available, including for commercial use. My interest was in what you could create by combining it.

Open public data was more than boring tables

I thought it was an interesting day. I said an agreement had been reached to publish lots of public data for free. I could not specify where the decision had been made, but thought it would happen gradually over the following years.

Where you previously had to pay for some information, I expected more would now become available free of charge. That was my account of the announcement in 2012, not an overview of the datasets, terms or prices that apply today.

I mentioned information about properties, the age and floor area of buildings, contaminated land, company accounts and CVR business registration information. There could be millions of rows of data.

It might sound boring in itself. But the interesting part was not just having a table. It was figuring out what a user could benefit from when the information was made available in a usable way.

A simple app could make information easier to use

I had spoken with a young man who had made an app for looking up vehicle registration numbers. According to my account, he had sold several thousand copies and made reasonable money from it.

In the video, I described it as looking up a number plate and seeing who owned the car. That was my imprecise description of the example, not a verified explanation of which personal or vehicle details the app actually showed.

The point was that relatively simple access to data could become a product. The user did not need to know the systems behind it.

I also mentioned Boliga, which, as I described it, used property information and displayed BBR building register reports and other data. There were already examples of businesses that had made existing information useful to their users.

What could you discover by combining datasets?

I had seen a suggestion to compare the locations of contaminated sites with cases of disease in those areas. Perhaps it could become a service that homebuyers would find interesting.

It was an idea I recounted, not a project I had carried out myself. I documented neither a link between contamination and disease nor access to the necessary information.

That illustrated my thinking: Could two or more datasets be combined in a new way so the result answered a question people actually had?

A hypothetical tool for freelancers

Another suggestion was a service for a freelancer doing an assignment for a company. Could you check whether the person ordering the work was authorised to act on the company’s behalf?

I mentioned procuration, or authority to sign for a company, as an example. My concern was that a company could later say the person placing the order had no authority to commission the work.

I discussed it as possible protection against fraud. It was a business idea, not a legal assessment of when an agreement is binding or what a particular register could prove.

Company data could be used for a risk profile

You could also imagine examining a company’s accounts before doing business with it. Did the figures suggest there was anything in the coffers?

I was thinking about building a risk profile from company data. Perhaps it could make some information easier to understand for someone assessing a customer or business partner.

It was a possible product, not a promise that accounts or a profile could guarantee payment. Above all, I wanted to show there were many different uses to consider.

Ask for examples of the data being released

If you made apps or websites and needed content, I suggested looking into the announcement. Search for information and contact the public authorities.

Ask what data is coming and whether you can get examples. Once you see what the information actually contains, it is easier to work out what you can build.

Then you can start thinking about which information can be combined and what new services it might produce.

Findvej was my example of using available data

I talked about Findvej as a service that, as I understood it, had combined available map and road data. I was not precise about where the maps came from or how the solution was technically built.

I compared it with Krak, which I described as a business that had spent a lot of money refining data itself. According to my account, a smaller developer could take information already available and put it together as a new service.

That was my illustration of the opportunity to compete through a good use of data rather than having to start with collecting all of it yourself.

Creativity could turn raw data into something valuable

If you made web apps or websites, liked databases and were creative, I felt there was something worth looking into. I ended with a casual remark about drinking beer and coming up with ideas.

The real encouragement was to imagine services people would want to pay for. Not just displaying more numbers, but using them for something that made sense to a user. You can find more of my experiences of turning opportunities into a business in Iværksætter til jeg dør.

The video was a little heads-up about something new I saw opportunities in at the time. The value had to come from the idea, the combination and the practical use of the information.