Public data and value creation in Italy.The findings from the Open Data 200 study

The debate developed around the value creation based on open data usage, raised exponentially over the years. However, «the commercial value of much core reference data was recognized well before the open data agenda took hold», as Boswarva reported in 2013. In Italy, data-sets of high commercial value are still the main source of revenue for some public bodies. This is the case of cadastral data and company register. The adoption of alternative business models for these data-rich organizations faces barriers and limitations. More investigations into the re-use of public sector information are needed to rethink how the public and private sectors can cooperate to achieve greater access, to improve value creation and to make well informed decisions based on evidence. In this article, the author takes the perspective of public data as a resource for value creation and discusses the findings of the Open Data 200 Italy study, an ongoing investigation into the re-use of open data.