Bridging the Data Divide:

Anthony Cosgrove, founder of Harbr, sat down with World of DaaS to share how vision for the future of data and the importance of seamless but responsible data sharing. His experience at HSBC, tackling financial crime and building sophisticated data platforms, revealed a critical gap between vast data repositories and the tools used by diverse teams. This insight led to Harbr's creation, aiming to revolutionize how organizations approach data marketplaces and governance.

From Financial Intelligence to Data Marketplace Innovation

Cosgrove's time at HSBC highlighted a pressing need for a solution that could bridge technical divides and enable collaboration. He recalls, "We had everyone from PhD astrophysicists who were data scientists down to people who were incredibly well-versed in geopolitics and languages, but didn't code at all."

The challenge wasn't just about data storage. As Cosgrove explains, "There was this quite pressing problem around the approach that was typically taken, which was, let's do a lot of ETL, let's put all of our data into one place." However, this approach fell short, particularly for non-technical users struggling to understand and discover data.

Harbr emerged as a response to these challenges, offering a platform that Cosgrove describes as a "data marketplace platform." It's a system where data products are made up of combinations of data assets, accessible to users of all technical levels.

Fast at times more important than right.

When asked about the most significant challenges facing the data industry, Cosgrove offers a thought-provoking perspective. He dismisses common concerns like data quality, storage location, or tooling availability as primary issues. Instead, he points to culture as a major hurdle.

"I think in the data space... it lends itself to people that are quite fastidious about things. And that doesn't necessarily always resonate well with value," Cosgrove observes. He argues that even data of poor quality can be tremendously valuable, but data professionals often struggle to see beyond perfection.

This cultural challenge extends to how organizations approach data product development. Cosgrove advocates for a more pragmatic, value-driven approach:

"Turning your data into a product, managing it as a product and really thinking hard about your target audience and the value you deliver is a good way to think about things."

Redefining Data Governance: Beyond Access to Usage

What sets Harbr apart is its focus on governing not just data access, but data usage. Cosgrove emphasizes, "Governing data access is one half of the coin, if you like. The other side is how do you govern use?" highlighting the importance of use-based governance. This approach allows organizations to maintain control over their data while still enabling collaboration and innovation.

Customization: The Key to Data Marketplace Success

Harbr's journey has been one of constant evolution, driven by market demands and customer needs. Initially conceived as a single, SaaS-based marketplace, Harbr quickly pivoted to offer customizable, branded platforms for its clients.

"We ended up building out a bunch of functionality around how you can embed different operating models, different templates, different branding, different user journeys," Cosgrove explains. This flexibility has allowed Harbr to cater to a wide range of clients, from major data vendors to large corporations looking to create internal data marketplaces.

The Evolving Landscape of Data Marketplaces

Cosgrove offers a nuanced view of the data marketplace landscape, dividing it into public and private marketplaces. Public marketplaces, like Amazon Data Exchange or Snowflake Data Marketplace, facilitate commercial transactions between data vendors and consumers. They support discovery, often with public indexing and searchable interfaces.

Private marketplaces, on the other hand, cater to a more curated experience for a defined audience. Some of Harbr's customers, including some of the largest data vendors globally, use the platform to create branded experiences for their customers. This approach allows for a more controlled, personalized interaction with data products.

For large corporations, private marketplaces serve as internal platforms for data product development and sharing across different teams and business units. This trend aligns with the growing popularity of concepts like data mesh and "data as a product," which emphasize decentralized data ownership and management.

The future of data marketplaces, as envisioned by Cosgrove and exemplified by Harbr, is not just about storing and accessing data. It's about creating value through carefully curated and governed data products, tailored to specific audiences and use cases. As more organizations recognize the potential of their data assets, the demand for sophisticated, flexible data marketplace solutions is likely to grow, reshaping how we think about and interact with data in the business world.