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Updated October 2026

Microsoft Teams data for AI training: can you license it?

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

Spirit Airlines' internal archive, about 500M Teams messages and 100M emails, drew a $10M bid from Google and rival bids from Mercor and micro1.1,2,3

Match my companyWhat is it worth?

For many companies outside tech, Teams is the company's memory: shift handovers, approvals, the chat where an operations lead talks a new hire through an exception. It holds the same kind of written reasoning buyers look for in Slack, often in businesses that have never thought of it as an asset.

The largest operating-company archive we know of was mostly Teams. Spirit Airlines' internal records, about 500M Teams messages alongside 100M emails, drew a $10M bid from Google, a $7.5M bid from Mercor and a late $12.5M bid from micro1. Mercor lists Teams among the tools it buys from. This page covers what in Teams buyers value and what to ask before export.

Buyers

Who buys Microsoft Teams data

Each reason is the buyer's own published statement naming Microsoft Teams or the kind of data it holds.

Featured partners

  1. #1 in our ranking

    7.7 out of 10

    micro1

    Lists internal comms, and filed a late $12.5M bid for Spirit Airlines' archive.4,3

    Typical payout
    $100K to $2M+, micro1 says5

    Watch out for: Says it removes personal details only "when relevant", so ask exactly how.6

    Get matchedRead the reviewVisit micro1

  2. #2 in our ranking

    7.4 out of 10

    Polyshares

    Buys chat history alongside email, tickets and ERP records.7

    Typical payout
    $100K to $2M+, Polyshares says8
    Fees
    None, Polyshares says9
    Time to get paid
    An offer in 1 to 2 weeks, then paid in 30 to 60 days10

    Watch out for: Exclusive by default, and every deal it lists is exclusive with no end date.11,12

    Get matchedRead the reviewVisit Polyshares

Everyone else we reviewed

By score, with full reviews. We have no referral agreement with these companies, so we do not link out to them.

  1. #3 in our ranking

    7.1 out of 10

    Mercor

    Lists Teams among the tools it buys data from, and bid on Spirit Airlines' Teams-heavy archive.13,2

    Typical payout
    Mercor does not publish a range14
    Fees
    None, Mercor says15
    Time to get paid
    By wire 2 to 4 weeks after signing16

    Watch out for: It confirmed a cyberattack in 2026, and class actions followed.17,18

    Read the review

We feature buyers that pay us a referral fee. Our scores and reviews don't change for it. How we earn. No buyer publishes prices by industry, so within each group the order is the same as in our main ranking.

What buyers value

What in Microsoft Teams buyers value

The column on the right is not legal advice: it lists what to raise with the buyer before anything is exported.

What in Microsoft Teams buyers value
DataWhy a buyer values itRaise with the buyer
Team channels and their filesWork organised by function, with documents attached to the conversation about them.Nothing specific
Group chats around a processApprovals and hand-offs between roles, step by step.Nothing specific
Meeting chat and recordingsDecisions and the discussion behind them.Whether recordings and transcripts are in scope.
Frontline and shift chatsOperational exceptions handled in real time.Employee names, schedules and personal details.
External (guest) conversationsCustomer and vendor service in writing.The other organisation's messages.

Process

How it works with each buyer

In each buyer's own published words. Where a buyer publishes nothing, we say so rather than guess.

micro1

What it buys
Internal docs, SOPs and playbooks, knowledge bases, project management workflows, internal comms, templates, CRM and workflow metadata, task histories4
Who qualifies
30 to 200 employees19
Offer range
$100K-$2M+ per data package; over $1M for unique data5
Personal data
PII removed "when relevant"6
Ownership
The company keeps ownership of its data and reviews samples before release20
Time to payment
Not published

Polyshares

What it buys
Slack, email, Drive, CRM, tickets, design files, calls and ERP7
Offer range
$100K-$2M+8
Personal data
A third-party PII partner scrubs data before it is licensed21
Excluded data
Data held on behalf of clients is excluded22
Fees
Charges sellers no fee9
Time to offer and payment
Offer 1-2 weeks after intake; paid Net 30-6010

Mercor

What it buys
Slack, Teams, Gmail, Outlook, Confluence, Salesforce, GitHub, Drive, Notion and 100+ other tools13
Who qualifies
Not published
Offer range
Not published14
Fees
No fees15
Security
SOC 2 Type II23
Time to payment
Wire 2-4 weeks after signing16

FAQ

Microsoft Teams data: questions, answered

  • Yes. Mercor lists Teams among the tools it buys data from. Spirit Airlines' archive of about 500M Teams messages drew bids from Google ($10M), Mercor ($7.5M) and micro1 (a late $12.5M).13,1,2,3

  • Nothing published says so. Buyers list both. What moves value is history, breadth and whether conversations link to outcomes in other systems, not which chat tool held them.13,7

  • Only if you offer them. Polyshares lists call recordings among the data it buys; others do not say. Recordings raise more personal-data questions than text, so decide early whether they are in scope.7

  • Buyers do not publish this. Ask each one how it extracts Teams data, who runs the export, and where it is held before personal details are removed.13

  • It depends on the buyer. Polyshares says a third-party partner scrubs personal data before licensing; micro1 says PII is removed when relevant. Get the method in writing and approve it before anything leaves your tenant.21,6

  • We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company: their team reviews this with you before anything is signed.

  • We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company: their team reviews this with you before anything is signed.

Before you sign

Legal questions go to the licensing company

We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company before you sign: their team reviews these with you.

Questions for this kind of business

  • Which export method will you use, and does our Microsoft agreement allow it?
  • How are guest and external messages handled?
  • Are recordings and transcripts excluded unless we opt in?

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

Every figure comes from a published source listed below, each with the date we checked it. Buyer statements are the buyer's own claims and are marked so in the source list. Firm counts come from the US Census Bureau's Statistics of US Businesses. Anything marked as our estimate is ours, not a buyer quote.

Drafted with AI assistance from our research files, then checked against each source. Reviewed 14 Oct 2026. Last updated 14 Oct 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 (23)

  1. 1.iTnews. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  2. 2.Bloomberg Law, published 17 Aug 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  3. 3.AI Weekly. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  4. 4.micro1 Enterprise Data Partnership page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  5. 5.micro1 company referral page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  6. 6.beri.net, published 10 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  7. 7.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  8. 8.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  9. 9.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  10. 10.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  11. 11.Polyshares data handling page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  12. 12.Polyshares track record page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  13. 13.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  14. 14.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  15. 15.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  16. 16.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  17. 17.TechCrunch, published 31 Mar 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  18. 18.HR Dive, published 13 Apr 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  19. 19.micro1 Enterprise Data Partnership page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  20. 20.beri.net, published 10 Oct 2026. Accessed 14 Oct 2026.
  21. 21.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  22. 22.Polyshares website. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.
  23. 23.Mercor Data page. Accessed 14 Oct 2026. Company's own claim.