Industry survey: Big Data important to most companies

A new survey of more than 1,500 senior executives in the U.S. and Europe makes clear how much businesses across the spectrum make use of data.

The poll released by BSA | The Software Alliance found that 67 percent of executics said that data analytics were important to ther companies, and that data analyis is important to 60 percent of small companies.  

For Washington and other global capitals, the results should make is clear how important it is to implement policies that don’t undermine companies using that data, said trade group head Victoria Espinel.

“I think all of those [findings] tell the story for why having government policies in place that will support data innovation is so important,” she told The Hill.

At the top of the list of pro-innovation policies, she said, are laws that don’t force companies to keep data servers in one place or try to balkanize the Internet by imposing limitations. Those policies, which some countries have contemplated in response to concerns about U.S. surveillance in the wake of Edward Snowden’s leaks, could have a disastrous effect on companies, Espinel warned.

Instead, countries should make trade deals that allow data to flow back and forth across borders free, she said.

That effort becomes harder, however, when lawmakers in Congress fail to pass surveillance reform, as has happened on multiple fronts this year.

 “Moving surveillance reform here in the United States I think would be very beneficial in terms of negotiating global trade standards, and negotiating global trade standards will be more difficult as long as surviellance reform does not move forward in the United States,” said Espinel, a former assistant U.S. trade representative.

“There is a very clear and direct link between those two policy issues.”