In the world of finance, the term asset has a particular meaning. Though you can’t always put a dollar figure on data, few would argue that an organization’s data is not an asset. Just try to imagine not having the data or access to it, and how important it is just got real. Search CIO brought this news to our attention in their article, ‘Infonomics treats data as a business asset.”

So do you need a line item in the budget for information? Gartner analyst Doug Laney, shared that 80% of business executives surveyed by Gartner believe data is on the balance sheet, tucked under other intangible assets. However, Laney disagrees.

“You probably have a better accounting of your tables and chairs than your own information assets,” Laney said. “Now ask yourself: Which one actually generates more value for your company?”

That value can’t be realized if we don’t have access to the data to begin with. Maintaining access to your data is important all the time, and especially during integration. Access Innovations is one of a very small number of companies able to help its clients generate ANSI/ISO/W3C-compliant taxonomies to make their information findable.

Melody K. Smith

Sponsored by Access Innovations, the world leader in taxonomies, metadata, and semantic enrichment to make your content findable.