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What kind of business data do AI companies want?

AI companies want records that show how real work gets done: how-to documents like SOPs, conversations like email and Slack, work tracking like tickets and project histories, money records like invoices, working files like CAD drawings, and code. Years of history, variety and records that link together are worth more. Personal and client files usually stay out.1,2,3,4,5,6

By Lead analyst (to be named) · reviewed by Reviewing editor (to be named) · published 14 Oct 2026 · updated 14 Oct 2026

The six kinds of records buyers ask for

Every buyer words its list differently, but the lists overlap. Put them side by side and six kinds of record come up again and again. Here they are, with the words buyers use.1,7,8

  1. How-to documents: SOPs, playbooks, manuals, training guides and knowledge bases. micro1 lists these first. Supersoniq's ads talk about old binders.1,9
  2. Conversations: email, Slack, Teams and Google Chat. Nyne names Slack, Teams and Google Chat histories plus email; Polyshares lists Slack and email; Mercor connects to Slack, Teams, Gmail and Outlook. SimpleClosure found Slack in 95% of the workspaces it evaluated.8,7,2,10
  3. Work tracking: support tickets, project histories, task logs and CRM records. Polyshares lists tickets and CRM. Nyne names Jira, Asana, Salesforce and HubSpot.7,3
  4. Money and operations records: invoices, orders, dispatch and scheduling data. Nyne names QuickBooks, Xero and NetSuite, plus dispatch and scheduling data.3,11
  5. Working files: CAD drawings, design files and call recordings. Ventra's ads say call recordings, CAD files, support tickets and email are in especially high demand.4,7
  6. Code: repositories and the tickets around them. Turing's Project Lazarus has a separate track for code, with a minimum of 50K lines.12

What makes the same records worth more

Variety beats volume. Surge AI says it looks for archives that cover a range of situations, from disagreements to tricky judgment calls. One firm's Slack with that depth can be worth more than another firm's Slack, email and calendars put together.5

Repeat work helps. micro1 says it looks for well defined workflows that employees carry out again and again. A shop that runs every job through the same steps has exactly that.13

Size, years and tools count too. Sunset values data by headcount, years in operation, data volume and how the team used its tools. Mercor says connecting more tools raises the payout.14,15

Records that link together are the best of all. Our reading of the buyers' lists, not a buyer quote: a ticket tied to its fix, or a quote tied to the job and the invoice, shows a whole piece of work from start to finish.13,7

What buyers usually leave out

Not everything is for sale. SimpleClosure never sells sensitive employee and health records. Polyshares leaves out data a company holds on behalf of clients. Return My Time keeps customer records, client-identifying details and privileged legal material out of its first scope.16,6,17

Personal details inside the records that are included get removed or swapped. Nyne's ads say client names are swapped for codes. Polyshares uses an outside firm to scrub data before it is licensed.18,19

Pros and cons

Pros

  • Buyers want everyday paperwork you already keep, not secret formulas.1
  • Ordinary tools count: QuickBooks, Gmail, Slack and Jira are all on buyers' lists.3,2
  • Messy, real conversations are a plus, not a problem.5

Cons

  • The records worth the most, conversations, carry the most personal details to clean out.20
  • Client files you hold for others are often excluded, which can shrink a service firm's package.6
  • Some software terms limit what you can export: Slack's API terms restrict bulk export for AI training.21

What it means for a business like yours

Take a 30-person plumbing and HVAC company. Its dispatch board, service tickets, quotes, supplier emails and the binder of install procedures cover five of the six kinds of record above. What it lacks is code, and most buyers do not need that.11,9,4

Before you call anyone, write down which systems you use and how many years each goes back. That one page is most of what a buyer's first call asks for. micro1 calls this list a data manifest.22,23

Should your business get in now?

Many businesses like yours are already licensing their records to these firms. micro1 has committed $1B over 12 months to buying company data. At least 18 brokers started advertising for business data between September and mid-October 2026. SimpleClosure has done over 150 data deals, and Google bid $10M for Spirit Airlines' archive, though the court has not ruled on that sale yet.24,25,26,27

Buyers also publish deals by industry. Polyshares, for example, lists a $110,000 license for a marketing agency. That is its own claim, like every payout a buyer or broker publishes about itself.28

Our view, not a promise: the money will not be around forever. AI labs are racing to buy now, budgets are concentrated in today's build-out, and as more businesses sell, prices tend to come down. There is no deadline, but waiting has a cost.24,29

It is not for everyone

Think twice if any of these sound like you:

  • Most of your records are client files you hold in confidence.6
  • Your team would feel their messages were sold out from under them.30
  • Your data is regulated or sensitive, which buyers ask about up front.23
  • Your archive is small: most buyers want 20-30+ staff and a few years of records.31,32,33,34
  • You cannot spare the weeks a deal takes.35,36,37
  • You are not comfortable losing control of how a licensed copy is used.38

Next step

Take the quiz to see which firms fit your business. Then talk to the brokerages: they can answer the questions unique to your business. Legal questions go to the licensing companies.

Take the quizWho the brokerages are

We feature companies that pay us a referral fee. Our scores and reviews don't change for it. How we earn.

FAQ

Questions, answered with sources

  • Records that show how work gets done: SOPs and manuals, email and chat, tickets and project histories, invoices and dispatch data, working files like CAD, and code.1,2,3,4

  • Yes. Polyshares and Ventra both list email, Nyne names email alongside chat histories, and Mercor connects to Gmail and Outlook.7,4,8,2

  • Nyne names QuickBooks, Xero and NetSuite among the systems it buys from. A Goldmined ad mentions orders, invoices and supplier emails.3,39

  • Variety, repeat workflows, more years and more tools. Sunset values data by headcount, years, volume and tool use.5,13,14

  • Commonly sensitive employee and health records, client-held data, customer records and privileged legal material, depending on the buyer.16,6,17

  • Some do. Turing's Project Lazarus runs a code track with a 50K-line minimum, and SimpleClosure sells repositories through its SourceCode line.12,40

  • Every business is different, so this one is best talked through with the buyer you're working with. Their team goes over it with you before anything is signed.

Before you sign

Questions to talk through with your buyer

Every business is different, so these are best talked through with the buyer you're working with. Their team goes over them with you before anything is signed.

Questions for this kind of business

  • Do any of our software vendors' terms limit exporting this data?
  • Do customer, vendor or platform contracts, NDAs or API terms restrict this?
  • Could the data include privileged material or trade secrets?

Questions for any buyer

  • Is the license exclusive, and for how long?
  • Can you sublicense the data, and to whom?
  • Which AI labs will receive it, and will you tell us?
  • How long do you keep it, and how is it deleted?
  • What is your liability cap, and who indemnifies whom?
  • Will the contract ban re-identification of people in the data?
  • Who removes personal data, by what method, and do we approve it first?

How this page was made

Figures come from the published sources listed below, and what a buyer says about itself is its own claim. Anything marked as our estimate is ours, not a buyer quote. Drafted with AI help from our research, then checked against each source. Not yet reviewed by a person, so search engines are asked not to index it. Updated October 2026.

We feature companies that pay us a referral fee. Our scores and reviews don't change for it. See how we earn and how we rank. This site does not give legal, tax or financial advice.

Sources (40)

  1. 1.micro1 Enterprise Data Partnership page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  2. 2.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  3. 3.Nyne sell-company-data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  4. 4.Meta Ad Library, Ventra, published 11 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  5. 5.MIT Technology Review, published 13 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  6. 6.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  7. 7.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  8. 8.Nyne data partnerships page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  9. 9.Meta Ad Library, Supersoniq, published 14 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  10. 10.SimpleClosure, What Your Assets Are Worth, published 3 Sep 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  11. 11.Nyne sell-company-data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  12. 12.Turing Project Lazarus process page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  13. 13.micro1 Enterprise Data Partnership page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  14. 14.MIT Technology Review, published 13 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  15. 15.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  16. 16.SimpleClosure press release (Business Wire), published 3 Sep 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  17. 17.Return My Time Sell My Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  18. 18.Meta Ad Library, Nyne.ai. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  19. 19.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  20. 20.Rocher, Hendrickx and de Montjoye, Nature Communications, published 23 Jul 2019. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  21. 21.Hunton Andrews Kurth, published 5 Aug 2025. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  22. 22.Summary of micro1's video "How to earn up to $2M training AI models with anonymized company data". Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  23. 23.micro1 data payout estimator. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  24. 24.The Next Web, published 9 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  25. 25.Meta Ad Library (our review). Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  26. 26.Forbes, published 16 Apr 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  27. 27.Bloomberg Law, published 17 Aug 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  28. 28.Polyshares track record page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  29. 29.TechCrunch, published 16 Sep 2025. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  30. 30.Slashdot discussion, published 18 Apr 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  31. 31.micro1 company referral page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  32. 32.Nyne sell-company-data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  33. 33.Cognor Labs partners page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  34. 34.Return My Time Sell My Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  35. 35.RemoWork, published 29 Jun 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  36. 36.Your Data Value website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  37. 37.Cognor Labs manufacturing page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  38. 38.micro1 Data License Master Terms, published 7 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  39. 39.Meta Ad Library, Goldmined.ai. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  40. 40.SimpleClosure press release (Business Wire, via 01net), published 3 Sep 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.