Government hails working examples of open data initiative

14.03.2012
Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has hailed the UK's drive to open up data to the public by showcasing success stories at a Digital Birmingham seminar today.

Speaking to SMEs, Maude praised how new businesses are being created by exploiting large tracts of open data that have been made available from a wide variety of government departments.

"Britain is leading the world by making ever more data freely available. Today, we are showing how companies including SMEs and start-ups, in Birmingham and beyond, are using open data to improve public services and create innovative products," he said.

"In the next few months, we will re-launch data.gov.uk - already the largest global resource of its kind - to make it easier to use, so that businesses and entrepreneurs can access free data more readily," he added.

The government has already made more than 5,400 datasets available via data.gov.uk and is planning to launch a £10m Open Data Institute, headed up by inventor of the internet Tim Berners-Lee, to help businesses maximise the commercial value of open data.

A by Chancellor George Osborne during his Autumn Statement last year valued open data in the UK to be worth approximately £16 billion.