The Trillion $$ Investment Waist-land

1 points by PetroFeed 14y ago ↗ HN

Some of the world's largest industries (oil, mining, forestry) are heavily dependant on data. However, the data leaders in these industries are operating with business models and technologies they started with in the 70's, 80's and 90's.

This sets them up for disruption, and with an estimated $96 trillion in CAPEX in oil and gas alone over the next 20 years, they should be worth looking at.

What I find vexing is that there is no source of capital to fund software innovation in these markets. The people with money in these markets are used to investing in hard assets. Software is a strange animal to them and difficult to wrap their heads around (in terms of investment, specifically in the early stages).

The traditional software investment community say they see the potential but don't want to invest in early stage companies addressing markets they don't understand. ---

I believe at some point VCs will notice how huge the natural resource markets are and how important data is to those segments. They have a unique set of challenges but they influence trillions of dollars and right now, in terms of software, they are relegated to investment waist-land.

I suppose it's hard to be the first one in but for a firm willing to take the time and understand what the data challenges are in these industries but I think it is within their ability. Data is data. Sure the data is unique to the industries but the challenges of collecting, adding structure and opening access are industry/use agnostic. The opportunity for the software investors is to translate consumer oriented ideas in a multi-trillion dollar forgotten segment that is critical to the world economy. ---

Of course, if anyone would like some deeper insight to what the challenges are, along with some ideas of how to address them I would be happy to go into detail.

My name is Ashley Dunfield and my mission is to collect, organize and open access to the world's natural resource data and markets.

http://ca.linkedin.com/in/ashleydunfield