What licensing your data means
Licensing data means giving another organisation permission to use copies of your records, on terms set out in a contract, usually in return for a fee. You don't sell the records, and you keep your own copies. The licence sets out what the buyer may do with the data, for how long, and what they must not do, such as identify your clients or pass the files on.
The main buyers today are companies building AI systems. They license data directly from the companies that hold it, or through marketplaces that sit in the middle: scoping the data, handling the contract and preparing the export.
Why AI developers want company records
AI systems learn from examples. Public web data is plentiful but shallow: it rarely shows how professional work is actually done, start to finish. Company records do. A closed legal matter shows the full file from instruction to outcome. A shop floor's maintenance log shows what failed and how it was fixed. A codebase's history shows how software was really built and debugged.
That's why buyers are paying for this material. In 2026 one AI training company announced plans to spend $1bn over a year licensing operational data from companies, including documents, procedures and project histories.
Which records are useful
What counts depends on your industry. Some examples:
| Industry | Typical records |
|---|---|
| Industrial | Project drawings, production and maintenance logs, inspection records, CAD assemblies, test results |
| Science and R&D | Process run records, lab notebooks, assay and characterisation data |
| Healthcare | De-identified patient records, consented visit recordings, imaging studies with reports |
| Software | Source code and its history, product databases, security investigations, AI usage logs |
| Finance | Deal and credit files, transaction tables, tax workpapers, proprietary market data |
| Professional services | Closed matter files, client deliverables and drafts, design systems, recorded calls |
| Media and games | Footage you own, game code and gameplay, journals and courses, campaign imagery |
What makes an archive more valuable
- Finished work. Completed projects and closed matters show the whole story, including the outcome.
- Linked records. Inputs tied to results, such as a recipe and its measured yield, or a ticket and the code that fixed it, are worth more than loose files.
- History. Several years of records show how work changes over time.
- Range and rarity. Varied work, and specialist material that's hard to find elsewhere.
What to check before you license anything
None of these rules licensing out. They're the questions that come up in scoping, so it helps to know your answers early.
1. Who owns it
Under UK copyright law, work your employees create in the course of their jobs normally belongs to your company. Work by contractors, freelancers and other firms usually belongs to them unless a contract says otherwise. Clients often own deliverables you made for them. Records your own staff created for your own purposes are usually the most straightforward to license.
2. Client confidentiality
Client contracts, NDAs and professional rules may limit what you can share, even years later. Check them, and check whether removing names and identifying details would be enough. Some work, for some clients, is best left out entirely.
3. Personal data
Business records contain more personal data than people expect: names and contact details, recordings of voices and faces, and in some industries health or financial information. Under UK GDPR it must be removed or properly protected before data is shared. Note that pseudonymised data, where names are swapped for codes, still counts as personal data. Health data is "special category" data and needs extra care.
4. Other people's terms
Software platforms, data vendors, stock libraries and open-source licences all come with terms that may restrict what you can pass on. Check the ones that apply to your records.
5. Regulation
Some sectors have their own rules: the FCA for financial firms, the SRA for solicitors, NHS and health-data rules for clinical records, and UK export controls for some technical data. Your adviser or compliance lead will know which apply.
How the process usually runs
- First conversation. What you hold, roughly how much, where it lives, and anything you'd exclude.
- NDA. Signed before any detail or samples are shared.
- Scoping. Agreeing what's in scope, checking restrictions, and agreeing how personal data will be handled.
- Preparation and export. Records are exported, and personal information is removed or protected.
- Licence. You see the terms (scope, permitted uses, duration, payment) and decide whether to sign.
What it's worth
There's no public price list, and anyone quoting a firm figure before seeing your records is guessing. Value depends on volume, completeness, history and how rare the material is. For reference, Mercor lists potential company earnings from $20k to $1.5M, depending on the industry and what's licensed. That is Mercor's own figure, not a promise or guarantee from us.
Guides by industry
- Industrial: construction, manufacturing, hardware engineering
- Science and R&D: semiconductors and materials, biotech and life sciences
- Healthcare: digital health, medical practices, imaging and diagnostics
- Software: cybersecurity, AI products, SaaS, software companies
- Finance: investment firms, payments and fintech, accounting and tax, hedge funds and quant firms
- Professional services: law firms, design and web agencies, consulting, contact centres
- Media and games: game studios, publishers and education, video production, consumer brands and photo studios
Common questions
Do we lose ownership of our records?
A licence is permission to use copies on agreed terms, not a sale. You keep your originals. Read the terms on scope, duration and permitted uses before signing.
Can we leave some things out?
You decide what to put forward. It's normal to exclude work for sensitive clients or anything under strict confidentiality terms.
Will our clients be identifiable?
That depends on the scope agreed and how the data is prepared. Raise it at the start if it matters to you or your clients.
Is licensing data allowed under UK GDPR?
It can be, provided personal data is removed or properly protected and there's a lawful basis for anything that remains. Take your own advice if you're unsure.
Source: The Next Web, "micro1 commits $1bn to buy company data for training AI agents".